Read more about Good.Clean.Fun in the Greenpoint Gazette.

1. Clean up litter as quickly as possible
2. Coordinate with other elected officials and agencies to ensure there are no duplicative efforts
3. Encourage non-government organizations, including businesses and nonprofit organizations, to become part of the solution
4. Engage Staten Islanders to be aware of the issue and to make it a norm to clean litter whenever the can through creative means
5. Explore new technologies that can help us more efficiently clean litter

Clean Up Staten Island bears some resemblance to Curb Your Litter: Greenpoint. Both programs target local businesses to maintain the street and sidewalk in front of their storefronts, and both include ways for residents to share input via smartphones.

After running the project for a year, the office released Clean Up Staten Island Report which details the accomplishments of the program. Major highlights include the establishment of an on-call litter response team, the allocation of $68,500 to each of Staten Island’s three City Council members to start their own litter initiatives. We commend BP Oddo’s commitment to tackling his Borough’s litter problem with such a comprehensive campaign.

Our personal favorite from the program’s list of accomplishments is the above Trash Talk poster campaign, which features a handful of residents putting the pressure on their neighbors to curb their litter problem. According to Oddo, “The most frustrating part of the current litter epidemic is that Staten Islanders themselves cause it. No one else can be blamed. It is a self-inflicted wound.” We couldn’t agree more!

If you live in the area shaded in red on the above map, you will soon be required by the City to separate your food waste from the rest of your trash.

In June, the NYC Department of Sanitation will deliver special containers to store your separated food waste to be picked up at the same time as your other trash and recycling. We’re excited to start separating our compost to help reduce the amount of overall trash sent to landfill in New York City.

Read more about what a resident of Park Slope had to say about adopting a new organics collection program in his neighborhood.

‘It’s dirty and it’s dangerous,’ she said of the West Street and Franklin Street blocks in Northern Greenpoint, an area that has no public trash cans. “The streets are filthy, rife with broken glass, trash, discarded mattresses and auto parts, even construction debris.'”

Read more from Meredith Hoffman’s 2013 article “Lack of Trash Cans Leaves Greenpoint Streets Strewn With Litter.”

In 2013, NBC 4 New York’s Roseanne Colletti reported on Greenpointers’ opinion that a lack of trash cans in the neighborhood is causing a major litter problem. See the full story.