A study conducted from 2018 to 2019 found over 500 million pieces of litter on roadways throughout Pennsylvania. The presence of litter degrades our natural environment, threatens public health, and negatively impacts community pride. Statewide, Pennsylvania spends $14 million a year to clean up litter, and even so you can still find it on our roads, in our neighborhoods, and along our rivers and streams.
 
Unfortunately, while some littering offenses include community service as a penalty, not all of our littering statutes allow a person convicted of a littering offense to be required to clean up litter. I believe that allowing for this type of a penalty would be a commonsense approach to teaching the value of using proper trash receptacles while keeping Pennsylvania beautiful.
 
Updating Pennsylvania’s litter laws to ensure consistency in the availability of litter clean-up community service as a penalty was also a recommendation of Pennsylvania’s Litter Action Plan, developed by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) and Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).
 
To help reduce littering and show offenders the consequences of their actions, I plan to re-introduce two bills that would ensure litter clean-up community service is a penalty available for all littering offenses in our laws. Please join me in support of this important legislation.