Cleaning up Marine Town

Clean up campaign making a difference

Marine Town residents are being thanked for their help in clearing up messy streets in the area.

Earlier this year, Swale Borough Council began a campaign to reduce the amount of rubbish and bins being left out on streets in the area.

This campaign was as a result of resident requests to tackle the mess on local streets. Around 70 per cent of the borough’s waste hot spots are in Marine Town, which cost time and money for the council to clean up.

Residents were spoken to, and homes in the area were sent leaflets reminding them where and when to put out their domestic waste. This was in an effort to discourage people leaving bags on pavements for several days, attracting pests, blocking footpaths and creating an unattractive environment for local people.

The overwhelming majority of residents were only too happy to help. The few residents that continued to put waste out incorrectly are written to warning them they may face fixed penalties if they continue to cause problems.

Emma Wiggins, interim director of regeneration at the council, said:

“The results of the campaign so far are encouraging, with streets looking noticeably cleaner and – for the first time in many years – Marine Town is not on top of the borough’s waste hotspot list.

“We’re grateful to local people for changing their habits, which in many cases were probably down to simply not knowing what they were expected to do – when you see others doing it, you might have thought it was ok to do the same.

“We are still monitoring those properties where there have been issues, and we won’t hesitate to pursue fixed penalty notices if necessary, but hopefully the message that we are serious has got through.”

At the start of the campaign, the council had 171 open cases where people were leaving bags of waste out incorrectly. This is now down to 94, with only one case at the final stage of the procedure where a further offence will result in a final warning before a fixed penalty notice can be issued.

http://www.swale.gov.uk/Cleaning-up-Marine-Town/