TURNING THE TIDE ON TRASH
Saturday pick-ups ‘making an impact’
“Everyone wants to put the onus on the homeless, but that’s just not true. They have their own issues, obviously. But they’re not the ones throwing stuff out of car windows. It’s the regular citizens and visitors to our cities.”
— Shelee Loughmille
Shakespeare may have said “All the world’s a stage,” but to many, the world apparently is a trash can.
And it aggravates Shelee Loughmiller. A lot.
Loughmiller, the city’s community and volunteer coordinator, has this thing about litterbugs. And show her a photo of one of the numerous random dumps around Vallejo and she seethes.
“I’ve almost been fanatical about it,” she said. And, since moving to Vallejo in 1998, the litter and dumping problem “has gotten progressively worse,” Loughmiller said by phone Friday.
Coordinating Saturday’s “Give Litter the Boot” events around Vallejo — this weekend it starts at the Solano Association of Realtors headquarters on Springs Road — is Loughmiller’s pride and joy.
“A vast majority of my week is spent on this particular project, figuring out with partners how we address it,” she said.
There has been “an uptick” of dumping and litter since COVID-19 hit, Loughmiller said.
“Everyone wants to put the onus on the homeless, but that’s just not true,” she said. “They have their own issues, obviously. But they’re not the ones throwing stuff out of car windows. It’s the regular citizens and visitors to our cities.”
The weekend community cleanups “seem to be making an impact,” Loughmiller said, praising the Realtors and Vallejo Rotary for a commitment to cleaning up the town.
As much as various agencies attempt to get a grip on garbage, “it continues to be bad,” Loughmiller lamented.
Roughly 70,000 pounds of trash monthly are picked up by the city, GVRD, and by the Vallejo Flood and Wastewater District, Loughmiller said.
“It has gotten better along some areas,” she said. “I’m hearing from residents that they are seeing a difference because there are more folks stepping up.”
Fast-food wrappers contribute considerably to the problem, Loughmiller said. Consumers think nothing about tossing a burger wrapper out the car window seconds after driving off.
An ordinance demanding accessible trash cans be placed by drive-thru establishments is a possible way to combat the problem, Loughmiller said.
Unfortunately, she added, many think nothing of tossing out that wrapper, receptacles nearby or not — “because they don’t care. It’s somebody else’s problem.”
Loughmiller encouraged residents to not just throw away their own trash property, but pick up others if it’s safe and disposable gloves are available.
Letting someone else’s litter remain doesn’t help the problem, she noted.
“I believe it encourages more trash and littering,” Loughmiller said.
If witnessing someone littering, Loughmiller suggests “picking it up and leading by example (by disposing it) and be obvious about it if you feel safe enough.”
Loughmiller hopes Vallejoans “get fed up” with others trashing the city — and soon. Discarded trash increased 100,000 pounds between 2019 and 2020 — with “a lot of mattresses” in the illegal dumps, says Loughmiller.
It’s unnecessary since Recology accepts unwanted mattresses, Loughmiller said, and the city sponsors three — with a possible four — free dump loads a year.
Beyond individual responsibility, Loughmiller encouraged the public to volunteer at any of the Saturday litter pick-ups, with the city-sponsored events including the “The Community Cleanup Tool Trailer” that offers use of trash bags, safety vests, masks, trash pickers, shovels, and rakes.
This Saturday’s pick-up starts at the Solano Association of Realtors, 1302 Springs Road, 9 a.m.
Future “Give Litter the Boot” events include:
March 13, Beautification Commission and Eagle Ridge Neighborhood Watch, Blue Rock Springs parking lot; March 20, Vallejo Watershed Alliance & Leadership Vallejo, 1461 N. Camino Alto (Lake Chabot Boat Launch — Dan Foley Park); and March 27, the Vallejo Police host at the Norman King Community Center, 545 Magazine St.
For more information, call (707) 648-8616 or email shelee.loughmiller@ cityofvallejo.net.
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