JAY – Residents raised concerns Monday over people putting their bagged trash out too early and having it ripped apart by animals, or blocking the sidewalks.
The town of Jay provides trash and recycling pickup to residents that is paid for through townwide taxation.
Resident Paul Gilbert said he is concerned that people put their trash out early, sometimes two to three days prior to Monday’s pickup in the Chisholm section of town.
There are aesthetic and health issues, Gilbert said. The trash attracts crows and raccoons and other animals, he said.
Gilbert said he called the town manager one night when he saw about 30 bags on the sidewalk in front of a residence and people had to walk out in the road to go around it.
Jay transfer station coordinator, Bob Sanders, told selectmen there were 164 bags at that particular site. He said a landlord had evicted tenants and hired a company to clean out the building.
Resident Hyla Friedman said the town employees picking up the trash and recyclables shouldn’t have to pick up the garbage that gets strewn around once a bag is ripped open.
She said it was responsibility of homeowners or renters to take care of their trash.
Al Landry, also a resident, said there are people who put trash out at 6 a.m. Mondays and the trash is not in containers and it gets blown all around prior to Monday pickup.
“I think the problem is they don’t put it in containers,” Landry said.
Sanders said the recycling containers the town gives to residents cost $25 a can.
If the town bought a covered trash can for everyone, it would add up, and some households have more garbage than what one barrel could contain, Sanders said.
Town Manager Ruth Marden said she would do some research to see how other towns are handling trash pick up and to see if they put restrictions on when trash goes out and the types of containers used.
Selectmen have the authority, Marden said, to set new rules under the town’s ordinance.
Selectman Alan Labbe, and Gilbert agreed, that there needs to be a balance.
“I don’t want to limit things so tight people don’t have flexibility,” Labbe said.
In other business, selectmen voted to give $400 to pay half the cost of brochures for the nonprofit North Jay White Granite Park presented by Mary Howes and her husband, Tim DeMillo.
The couple has a 1-mile trail that goes around Howe’s Apple Orchard on Woodman Hill in North Jay that has great views and will be open to the public once a gravel parking lot is installed.
There is also a small outlet trail from the orchard that brings people to a small quarry that has white granite and paving pieces. The couple is also working to get a right-of-way to a larger granite quarry near the orchard, Howes said.
They also plan a picnic area, she added, eventually they would like to build a quarry museum.
The couple is accepting donations for the park, which can be sent to North Jay White Granite Park, 14 Woodman Hill Road, Jay, ME 04239.
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