Look, I’m not trying to paint myself as any sort of environmentalist.
It tickles me, though, when I read stories in our local newspapers and then I see what I see while I’m walking to shul on Shabbat.
There’s this obvious and worthy push towards the “greening” of Baltimore. It’s almost become a cause of righteousness among the printed media here.
Certainly the area’s major media are covering this and probably it wouldn’t take long to find some sort of editorial support backing these efforts.
But here’s what I see, and I know many of us see on our way to shul.
I see the plastic yellow, white or blue binding plastic used to bind stacks of newspapers. Only I don’t see them in trash cans. Instead, they are on front lawns, dangling on the sewer grates or just sitting pretty blatantly in the street.
A couple of years ago while working on a CHAI-sponsored Neighborgood Day, I worked in the Western Run creek. Ranking second behind discarded bottles and cans were strips and strips of these plastic binders. I mean I don’t think they were choking off the movement of the stream. But the local newspaper delivery people chose to use the stream as a dumping point for the materials. The materials were wrapped around rocks and tangled among branches.
But there’s more.
The very paper that we get on our doorstep is bagged in a yellow bag. The bags are attached to a cardboard handle that can hang on their car rearview mirrors. Slip the paper in the bag and toss it on the front lawn. Fine.
When the bags are used up, guess what often happens to the leftover yellow plastic and the cardboard handles.
They end up in the street as well.
It’s so blatant that there are often three or four of these handles just dumped on the corner.
I know it’s a small issue. But our local daily newspapers aren’t helping. If anyone would ask the editors of these papers, they’d probably be the first to say that they believe in a sound environment. Truth is, I doubt many of them even know that the remnants of getting their publications to their readers are being littered all over the community. But as you are walking in your communities, be it for exercise or for a walk to shul on Shabbos, count how many of these pieces of plastic you see.
Maybe call the local dailies and let them know.
Before we can be green, we’ve got to be clean.
Deliver the news.
But do it without leaving us to deal with your trash.