‘Lazy dumpers’ let down district
‘Lazy dumpers’ leaving dirty nappies, cigarette butts and takeaway containers continue to spoil the Levin landscape despite less rubbish being dumped overall.
A blue rubbish bag full of the offending items was collected by volunteers in just one sweep of the Adventure Park on Saturday as part of the nationwide Keep New Zealand Beautiful week, September 10-16.
Councillor Victoria KayeSimmons, chairwoman of Keep Levin Beautiful which coordinates the Horowhenua clean up, said some of the rubbish was next to rubbish bins.
“I just don’t understand the nappy thing. Why not put it in the car and put it in the bin at home? What do people think happens to dirty nappies left on a pavement?”
Her team of six was one of many groups including early childhood centres, schools, organisations, individuals and the Baptist Church Girls Brigade cleaning up Horowhenua streets, parks, reserves and beaches throughout the week, including 245kg of rubbish from Levin, collected from three local reserves, one park and some residential streets, and 210kg of rubbish from Foxton collected by about 50 volunteers on Saturday.
Kaye-Simmons believes they are collecting less rubbish each year, including plastic straws this year as there appeared a concerted effort not to use them, but it was just “lazy dumping” letting the district down.
“[This is rubbish] that people can take home but make the decision not to do that. Our contractors do a good job considering what is dumped on a continual basis. Don’t blame them, blame the lazy dumpers.”
She wanted to thank everyone who took part in the clean up week, including Recreational Services for the final collection and weighing of rubbish. Saturday was also ‘world clean up day’ — One Day, One Planet, One Goal — in which NZ was one of 150 countries taking part.
Kaye-Simmons said KNZB had recognised the irony of using non-degradable plastic bags for the collections and was in the process of thinking about how it could better implement environmentally-friendly bags and gloves for future clean-ups.
The cost of illegal dumping for Horowhenua District Council in the 2017/18 financial year was $11,666.