Help eliminate litter, one piece at a time

Dear Editor:

About 1980, I started a personal commitment that has become a lifelong habit: I pick up one piece of litter every day and dispose of it responsibly.

I don’t clean up a whole area or a whole street. Just one piece of litter. Litter can be as small as a cigarette butt, a receipt, a candy wrapper or a used lottery ticket. It can be as large as a water bottle, coffee cup, or plastic grocery bag. I may find a piece of litter when I stop for gas, on the way to church, or as I walk across the parking lot where I work.

My purpose in writing this letter is to invite and encourage everyone to join me in picking up one piece of litter every day and disposing of it responsibly. I’m asking every parent and every child, all teachers, all students, every mayor, every councilman, all county employees, city employees, county executives and legislators, every businessman and every customer, and every homeless person to please join me in picking up one piece of litter every day and disposing of it responsibly.

In Poughkeepsie, that means over 30,000 pieces of litter picked up everyday with no additional taxes and very little effort.

In Kingston, over 20,000 pieces of litter picked up every day and, in Middletown, over 25,000 pieces of litter picked up everyday.

Please join me in making a difference — one day at a time, one piece of litter at a time.

Bill Sepe, Poughkeepsie Editor’s note: Bill Sepe conceived of and initiated the effort to rehabilitate the former Poughkeepsie-Highland Railroad Bridge into what is now the Walkway Over the Hudson State Park.