A group of local residents on Streetlife are looking to take some direct action and have planned a Litter Pick for Sunday 12th April at 11:00am. The details posted on Streetlife are as follows:
“We will start “picking up” on Sunday 12 April 2015 at 11am starting from the small Round about at junction with Havant Road and picking up along the verges opposite Fullers Unit towards Morrisons and London Road turning left towards Waterlooville. We propose to do an hour every Sunday weather permiting, If its blowing a huwly and raining hard then cancel until following Sunday.”
All credit to the community for tackling this head on.
EHDC supports community litter picks and have offered to provide a stack of bin bags, 12 litter pickers (the long reach litter picking tools) and will also take away the binbags at the end of the pick.
This litter has been worse than previous years and it is not due to late contracts but following a number of deaths of road side cleaning crews new working practices had to be agreed with the HSE and the Unions, then the contractors. EHDC and other authorities need to make sure that the people doing this can work safely. For the last 3 weeks they have been concentrating on the A3 and main trunk roads, then into other areas. There is more on this link here: https://horndeanmatters.com/2015/03/08/litter-along-the-roadside/
EHDC are also putting resources into enforcement to catch and fine people dropping litter (and dog fouling) and the intent is to build up to a team of 6. There is more on this link here https://horndeanmatters.com/2015/03/29/fouling-litter-zero-tolerance/
Finally in addition to the fixed contracts that clean the roads (the A3, trunk roads are litter picked twice a year) there is now a full time litter cleaning operative based in the area to cover Horndean, Clanfield and Rowlands Castle to deal specifically with complaints or fly tipping. If you email the customer services team at EHDC with the area then the man with the van will be tasked to go there.
I will be there on the litter pick to help and hope that as many other people as possible can take part too!