Commentary: Since when is it OK to toss trash on Glendale’s streets or on people’s lawns?
Every day, I take my dog out for a walk, several times. We walk the streets by Glendale Community College and every day I see so much trash on the streets that I’m amazed and disgusted. Since when is it OK to just toss things in the street or on someone’s lawn?
Maybe it’s ignorance. About 30 years ago, I was walking on Wilshire with a receptionist from work. She was eating something and just tossed the paper in the street. I stopped, looked at her incredulously and said, “Don’t you know that everything you toss in the street ends up in the ocean?” She answered, “No, I didn’t know that,” and she picked it up.
Our litter leaves sea life sick or dead and sickens people who swim in the ocean.
What amazes me is that no one is taking responsibility for picking up the trash in my neighborhood. People who live here live mostly in apartments, but that’s no excuse. It may be an apartment and you may not own it, but that doesn’t mean you don’t use the yard or park on the street, so why wouldn’t you pick up the trash in front of your place? And where are the landlords who are supposed to take care of their property?
I live in an apartment, and I quit waiting for someone else to step up, so I’m doing it myself. For the last two weeks, I’ve gone out with rubber gloves and a trash bag and picked up the trash and cigarette butts lining my section of Verdugo Road. (I’ve even picked up dog poop left by those disgusting owners who do not pick up after their pet.) Unfortunately, I’m sure more trash will be back in a week.
There is no magic fairy who’s going to come along and pick up your crap! It doesn’t happen unless you live on my street, and this fairy is getting sick of it! If there are street-cleaning crews in this part of Glendale, I’ve never seen them!
Your cigarette butts, food wrappers, bags of dog poop — you name it — just get walked over or driven over again and again, then swept into our rivers and oceans. Thanks, but I do not want to swim with your cigarette butts and trash. Neither do our fish, the ones that are still alive.
Don’t litter. Don’t drop your cigarette butts in the street, and for God’s sake, clean up after your dog. Teach your children and grandchildren to take pride in our city and not litter. We have one planet, and every day it gets more and more crowded — let’s not totally destroy it.
FRAN TUNNO is a longtime Glendale resident. Read more at www.AtFransTable.com and www.frantunno.com.