PORTLAND, Ore. — Environmental and public health groups say cigarette butts are the most littered item on earth, making up nearly 40% of all collected litter.   Worldwide, that adds up to four and a half trillion cigarette butts disposed of on the ground and in our oceans.   Today's Everyday Hero has found a way to reduce the number of butts on Portland streets, helping the environment and Portland’s homeless.   -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------   For the past three weeks, Chelle Hammer has been paying cash for discarded cigarette butts, to the tune of about $2 an ounce, or two bucks for each one hundred collected.   “One day Chelle came up with her cart, put out her little table and her scale, put up a little sign that said she was buying cigarette bucks,” said Tyrone Grove.   Grove figured he'd try it himself.   “Found out it was pretty lucrative,” Grove said. “I mean, I could go out in a couple hours and make 30, 40, 50 bucks. Easy.”   Hammer, who worked for Amazon from 1998 through 2011 before starting her own company (and subsequently getting laid off this past summer), has been helping the homeless near her house at McCormick Pier under the west end of the Steel Bridge for decades.   “These guys are my neighbors, and it’s important to me to help my neighbors,” she said. “And so, that’s what I do.”   Her support came in the form of grilled cheese sandwiches, cookies and soft drinks.   But with the help of her church, a GoFundMe site, PDX Butts4Butts, and her own money, she hit on the idea of paying people for cigarette butts, which are made of a cellulose acetate, a form of plastic that’s slow to decompose.   “I was thinking, what can we do because there’s a lot of trash but not a lot of cans and bottles because of the redemption program. So I thought, what would be the next logical thing, and I came up with cigarette butts,” she said.   In just three short weeks, she has collected, paid for and recycled more than 45 pounds -- or about 72,000 discarded cigarette butts.   “I collected a whole bunch of them,” said Dan Whitehouse. “I wanted to make sure the lady was serious, and she’s really serious.”   Whitehouse is a believer in the program.   And he's developed a strategy.   “I go to places where people gather, like bars, restaurants or waiting near train stops, because they don’t allow you to smoke on their stops,” Whitehouse said.   Hammer said the effort pairs with her and her church's philosophy.   They’re excited about it, yeah,” she said. “The two values that we have at the church and one of them is helping the homeless and helping other people, and the other is helping and cleaning the environment.”   The butts collected by Chelle Hammer are recycled by a company called TerraCycle and made into shipping pallets, plastic lumber and decking and, yes, ashtrays.