Council Looking For Solutions To Trash Troubles Along Charlotte Area Roads

CHARLOTTE, NC – Troubles with trash along Charlotte area roads is getting worse, according to city officials.

“It’s not just us. For some reason, It’s kind of just inundated Charlotte,” said Tobe Holmes.

Holmes is the Interim Exec. Director at University City Partners. He says the waste is hard to keep up with. They contract with a service, but that’s not always enough.

“We can only pick up so much litter honestly,” said Holmes.

“We’ve been working on it for a while,” explained district four council member Renee Johnson

Johnson says she’s met with community and state leaders to address the issue.

“It should be referred to the intergovernmental committee because many of the roads especially in district four are state owned,” said Johnson.

NC DOT spends about 10 million dollars on trash pickup through the state. They do collections and sweeps four times a year.

“If we could hire a vendor or I don’t know what the solution is, but it’s something we certainly need to talk about more,” said Johnson.

The waste woes have picked up in recent years. At last night’s council meeting, Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles suggested a lack of volunteer groups is also contributing to the problem.

“But with Covid, for two years they’re not willing to do that,” said Lyles.

While elected leaders work on solutions, Holmes says it all starts with residents.

“I think we have to start better engaging our community in helping out and hopefully kind of re-instilling that sense of pride that I feel like kept litter off our roads for so many years up until that last few,” said Holmes.

You can make an impact next month during the annual Big Spring Clean. Volunteers will be cleaning trash from local water ways.