After a long winter, litter’s out of control

We’re just a few days away from the official beginning of spring.

After three very cold months dating back to the beginning of December, it appears that this winter has finally broken. December 2010 was several degrees colder than our average Decembers.  It chilled our county, chasing the stripers out early, hardening the ground and bringing fuel trucks to our homes and businesses more frequently than we’re used to.

The cold that December brought stayed and stayed and stayed. That’s making the warming and lengthening days even more welcome.

The cold isn’t the only thing that hung around this winter.  Litter is another thing that long winters tend to accentuate.  There’s not as much vegetation hiding the cups and plastic and cans that blow along our roadways and get caught up in the grass, trees and bushes beyond the shoulders.

The amount of trash lining our main roads, back roads and approaches to our parks appears especially voluminous this year. This week we celebrated the year’s greenest holiday: St. Patrick’s Day. As if on cue, the county’s fields of winter wheat, barley and rye are greening, adding color to the otherwise drab winter palette of grays and browns.

We can keep that celebration going by making an effort to get the winter’s litter bloom under control.  Many organizations have joined forces with Delaware’s Department of Transportation to adopt sections of roads and highways to help with the cleanup effort.  Their accomplishments, measured in bright orange plastic bags filled with items picked up along the roads, make a big difference in making our county a better place to live.

In addition, many prisoners at Sussex Correctional Institution – for whom cabin fever is part of their punishment – take advantage of warmer weather to sign up for highway cleanup details.  Much of their work takes place in areas where mowers eventually work, and those efforts are especially important so trash isn’t simply shredded and spread even farther across the landscape.

Our people resources are strong in Sussex, and if everyone takes just a few minutes to help with litter cleanup around their communities, the green coming with spring will be even more attractive for those living here and to those who visit and make such an important economic contribution to our resort area.