From left to right; Gail Hakola, Pete Bowman, and Michelle Hayes pose for a photo during a trash clean-up in the Seminary Hill area of Centralia Thursday afternoon.
Gail Hakola and Pete Bowman clean-up trash in the Seminary Hill area of Centralia Thursday afternoon.
Employees of the Sticklin Funeral Chapel in Centralia dedicated two hours of their workday Thursday to picking up the litter left along Seminary Hill Road — collecting eight full bags of trash in two hours.
“I thought ‘you know what, I think we could do a really nice thing if once a month Sticklin gets a few people, we pick a location and we come out for two hours and pick up the garbage’ because it sure seems like it’s becoming a real problem. People are just tossing everything out of their cars and it’s sad, it really is,” said Michelle Hayes, location manager at Sticklin Funeral Chapel.
Hayes, Pete Bowman, reserve deputy coroner with Lewis County Coroner Office and Gail Hakola, funeral assistant, could be found wearing neon orange vests on the side of Seminary Hill Road on Thursday from 12:30 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. picking up litter.
“Littering on the side of the road is just an eyesore and really it’s unsafe. If there’s children or bicyclers they could have an accident because of it. It’s just something that needs to be done— simple as that,” said Bowman.
The City of Centralia provided the volunteers with the grabbers to pick up the trash and the plastic bags to put them in. The city also picks up the filled trash bags afterward if the volunteers tell them where the bags are located. Hayes, Bowman and Hokola left their bags at the bottom of the Seminary Hill Road.
“It would be great if other people could follow in our footsteps. If other companies could devote a couple of hours a month and pick a place to clean up. All they have to do is contact the code enforcement officer, Kevin, and the city provides the bags and the tongs. We just let them know where we leave the bags of garbage and they’ll come to pick them up,” Hayes said.
Hayes said she attended the recent code enforcement workshop held by the City of Centralia on Tuesday and it inspired her to take action and help clean up the city.
“I’ve lived in Centralia since 1963 and to see all of the trash around is really sad. I hope that by getting more people involved we can turn our city around and clean it up,” said Hayes.
Hayes said now that Sticklin Funeral Chapel started dedicating a couple of hours a month to picking up trash she has been on the lookout for areas that could use some cleaning up. She said next month they will probably focus on Gold Street at the bottom of the viaduct in Centralia.
“We want to clean up the city and inspire others to do the same, challenge other businesses to spend a couple of hours a month volunteering. As the mayor said, if you see it, pick it up. Don’t pass it by. We have to start a trend that we’re not going to stand for this and if we start to take care of it maybe others will follow,” Hayes said.
The three volunteers said they were surprised by the amount of trash that had been thrown out on the side of the road, specifically the number of empty bottles of alcohol that they had picked up.
“Having trash along the side of the road is just unsightly. It’s not part of the natural environment,” said Hakola.
