I saw a man throw what I believed to either be unfinished food or a crumpled up wrapper, then not long after that, I drove by an animal carcass. I and others have been noticing more and more trash on the streets lately, and especially more roadkill. These issues, if left unchecked, can hurt our community and people’s mindsets on the environment. The persistent presence of litter and roadkill on Fairfax roads not only undermines community morale and environmental stewardship but also reflects a failure in addressing public awareness and enforcement measures. Plus the lack of enforcement allows for the unchecked behavior of littering our environments, and leading to a lack of community responsibility in people. Of course, the biggest issue we all share concerning this topic is what do we do? Most people, myself included, will see trash or roadkill and simply avoid it, because what can we do about it anyway. Well there are systems in place to handle this, but it clearly isn’t very well known and relies heavily on people’s cooperation. Fairfax’s public works department is in charge of collecting animal carcasses, and the Virginia Department of Transport handles trash collection. How they work is that people must call them to report the trash or carcass. 703-385-7980 is the number for the public works department. 1-800-FOR-ROAD is the number for the Virginia Department of Transport. Our ecosystem is fragile, so even our city streets must be handled with care.
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