To the editor,

I believe, we, as a community, should be more aware of our surroundings and should show that we want to be proud to live here in Windham. Over the past year or more, I have noticed more and more trash, garbage, and miscellaneous items in the ditches and gutters along the roadsides of Windham, especially the River Road only because that is the road we travel more than any other.

Am I the only person in this town that has noticed this? I believe that the town, whether they choose to use the prisoners from the correctional center, or people that have been sentenced to do community service for whatever reason, should use their time constructively and clean up the gutters and ditches of our town.

Maybe, just maybe, a good senior project would be to have the upcoming seniors of Windham High School do a great community project to show how much they care for the town they live in. The town could provide the Windham garbage bags, let the kids fill the bags, leave them along the side of the road and the trash company could pick up the bags on the next garbage day. To head up a project that would truly benefit this town tremendously, plus make them all feel good about doing something good for their town.

The main routes that lead into our town are especially bad. River Road is absolutely appalling to drive on and see the garbage that is along the sides of the road is disgusting. Some of this trash is because of garbage pick-up day.

What irritates me is when an item has blown out of the recycle bins and the contractor that got the bid for trash pick up is too lazy or doesn’t want to take an extra two seconds and bend down to get a piece of cardboard or some other item that has blown out of the bins. The town (us as taxpayers) have paid a big price to have our garbage picked up each week. I feel that they should take the extra minute and make sure they pick up everything. That way some or most of the trash wouldn’t end up in the ditches and gutters in the first place. I know that I have personally called and was told that they don’t want to put their people in jeopardy with traffic. Well, the ditches and gutters, as far as I know, are not where people drive their vehicles.

It’s not just the garbage pick-up people, it’s also people that are just plain inconsiderate and throw their trash out their windows. I see coffee cups, empty cigarette packs, beer bottles, soda cans, and I could go on and on. In the state of Maine, I thought, we have a law that prohibits us from littering.

My opinion, for what it’s worth, is to let the prisoners from the Correctional Center, be supervised, and have them clean up the sides of our major roads, i.e., River Road, Route 202, Route 302 and Route 115 and Route 35. Or even a combination of all three – the community service people, a senior project and the people from the correctional center – all combined might make a world of good. Every little bit helps. These are the main routes that bring people from other towns and other states into our town and it would be nice to have people comment on how clean and beautiful this community is, instead of look at all the trash around. That isn’t a good first impression for any tourist, rather our own townspeople, that drive these roads every day to and from work.

It would be nice to say, let the people take care of the ditches in front of everyone’s houses, but you and I know that it isn’t reality. Not everyone is going to participate, unfortunately. This is just a thought from just one citizen of this town that I love living in. Please, if anyone else feels the same way that I do, speak up and maybe the town will or can do something about it in the month of June before summer starts.

Diane Everett

Windham