Littering at Edgewood Park has just reached a new level

So, on Saturday after art walk, I walked thru Edgewood park to head home and stopped by the isolated swing set that’s a few feet away from the bathrooms + playground. I couldn’t believe my eyes of what I was seeing… someone (or multiple people) decided to throw a makeshift BBQ and left their mess to be cleaned up by someone else! So many plates and red solo cups thrown around. Large bottle of reposado tequila smashed into large and microscopic glass shards, tree stump used as a fire pit, left behind grill AND its box, plastic bags left behind. After seeing that, I planned on coming back the same evening with a garbage bags and gloves but unfortunately I got interrupted with something else when I got home.

Fast forward to yesterday, Monday morning, I go on my usual walk with my dog; this time with garbage bags and gloves fully prepared to start cleaning it up. FYI: These pictures were taken yesterday (Monday). Anyways, I run into 2 trucks of park & rec workers I’m thinking perfect! I’ll just let them know about the trash area! I speak with them, they seem surprised and reassure me that they will pick it up. I’m like okay cool awesome 👍🏼 I hang around for a bit with my back turned to the trucks (dog is taking a dookie) and when I turn around, they have driven off away from the swing sets 😐. I feel confused so I continue to walk straight across Ella T Grasso where I see the same truck I spoke with. I still felt confused about what whether they were going to clean it up or not but I want to give them the benefit of the doubt…

So where am I going with this? Well, right now I am out of town until Wednesday. What if parks & rec doesn’t pick it up? What if I check Wednesday and the same mess is by the swing set? If this were to happen, who do I reach out to about this? You might read this and think “it’s just another day at Edgewood, ignore it”. But that’s the problem. I’ve lived near Edgewood park for 5 years and I’m constantly dodging broken glass, dropped chicken bones, scattered pieces of garbage. I don’t have kids but I have dogs, I can’t imagine having a kid and having to say “sorry actually we can’t do the swing sets today bc there’s a lot of a broken glass here!”

So, ask yourself this, do you want to keep living in a city that is filled with hazardous, smelly, disgusting litter? Or do you want to live somewhere that you can feel proud and content with the environment? If your answer is the latter then let’s band together to do something about it! Starting with Edgewood Park. And if not, please give me suggestions on which city organizations I can contact so I can bring this to their attention? TIA.