OXFORD – (AP) Lafayette County officials say trash is everywhere in the community, and they are looking for help to get the problem under control.
The Oxford Eagle reports county officials have declared war on litterbugs. They say fast-food wrappers are a particular nuisance.
Even the county sheriff’s office has been enlisted to pick up trash.
“We try to pick up the county, but we ask people to help,” road manager Jerry Haynie told the Lafayette County Board of Supervisors.
Remnants of lunch meals tossed out onto highways also are a big problem, Haynie said. “There is no sense in it,” Haynie said.
The state Department of Transportation has an anti-litter campaign, Think Green, Keep Mississippi Clean. The campaign focuses on education, enforcement and elimination. The programs under its umbrella offer some support.
But it’s all of little help, officials say, when trash flies out of the bed of a pickup truck, causing a road hazard and an eyesore on local roads.
And then there are the deliberate dumpers.
“The hard part about it is an officer has to see you doing it or some type of evidence that you can prove that that person did it,” Oxford Police Chief Mike Martin said. “There is no excuse for it.”
Martin said the misdemeanor charge for littering can be up to $500 or six months in jail.
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