Just Say No!

            The Public Trust recently adopted almost 2 miles of the highway along Mayport Road headed into Mayport Village.  After the Florida Department of Transportation posted the “Adopt a Highway” sign recognizing our organization, we were finally authorized to clean up our part of the road.  We gathered the troops (all three of us) to perform the cleanup on a Thursday morning, not realizing how much trash would be waiting for us.

Roadside litter is not only unsightly, but it’s costing the taxpayers millions of dollars a year and is unsafe for the wildlife.  The Florida Department of Transportation spends around $10 million a year and local governments spend thousands of dollars cleaning up cans, bottles, newspapers, and other trash alongside the roads.  Although the state of Florida doubled the littering fines from $50 to $100 in 2006, the state has since only collected $213,000 (about $71,000 per year—a small fraction of how much litter is produced throughout the state).  Even worse, one-third of the Florida counties haven’t fined a single person for littering since the fines were raised to $100!

Litter can also be dangerous for the wildlife.  Smaller animals can get stuck inside the cans or ingest pieces of the glass or plastic bottles.  Trash on the roadside can lure them to dangerous territory next to a busy highway.  Litter can be a perfect haven for disease-spreading insects to reproduce.

Our office field trip to clean our highway lasted all morning.  Even though we had three workers, we only finished a little more than half of the area we set out to clean up.  The time-consuming and expensive process can be avoided if people just used the trashcans instead of the roadside.  It sounds easy enough, but as much as we try to raise awareness, there will always be those people who do not care about the environment or believe someone else will pick up after them.  For these people (as disappointing as it is), the Public Trust will take the initiative to clean up their trash along that designated two-mile stretch four times a year.  Even the litterbugs will get to appreciate the green grass and marshlands along our stretch of Mayport Road.

Beth Caudill