Pick A Street: Making Havering Litter Free

The Havering Daily is pleased to announce, it has partnered with the Harold Hill Wombles and Havering Council’s Street Care team, to launch a borough-wide littler picking campaign called ‘Pick A Street‘. The first event will run over four days, from 2nd-5th April.

As COVID restricts us from meeting in large group events, this event will be carried out in unison across the borough. Residents can sign up to join our campaign and pledge to litter pick their street or local green space. Residents can choose to litter pick as many times as they wish over the four days. All we ask is, you take a picture with the picked litter bags (maybe in front of a street sign), and post it in our Facebook group (Join here) using the hashtag #PickAStreet or email the pictures directly to the Havering Daily so we can share them with the community (newsdesk@thehaveringdaily.co.uk).

In Havering, we pride ourselves on having a borough that has many parks and beautiful areas. It is important we keep Havering litter free and would love for the community to come and join this event.

Havering Council’s Street Care team has kindly donated litter picking equipment, so those who do not have any themselves can still take part in the event. They will also be working with us to collect any litter filled bags over the event weekend. If many bags of litter are picked, residents can arrange for the bags to be collected via the ‘Love Clean Streets‘ app.

If you manage to only fill 1 or 2 bags, we ask that you take these home so they can be put out with your rubbish on your waste collection day. This will help reduce the pressure on the Street Care team.

For more than 2 bags, please leave them safely in any of the below areas and immediately report them via the ‘Love Clean Streets‘ app.

• Residential streets – at the end of the roads or next to council bins
• Mains roads – bus stops, laybys or council bins
• Carriageways – bus stops or laybys
• Parks – by parks bins

There was a limited amount of equipment available and we have now assigned all available kits. This does not mean you cannot take part, but it does mean you will have to arrange your own equipment for the event.

This is a community event for everyone to join in. Whether you are an experienced picker or just keen to help keep Havering tidy, please register your interest via our Facebook event here https://www.facebook.com/events/164414005503102

Please be aware, you must not meet in groups to litter pick, and also stick within the current COVID restrictions.

Havering Council has shared a Risk Assessment, which we ask all to review before any litter picking happens. The Assessment for litter picking includes issues relating to the pandemic.  Please ensure all those who wish to participate review this and adhere to it whilst taking part in the event.

Councillor Osman Dervish, Havering’s Cabinet Member for Environment, said:

“We all want a clean and tidy borough and are supporting the Pick A Street campaign with our Street Care team providing equipment and helping to collect the litter.

“In April 2019 we launched the Cleaner Havering campaign to highlight our increased investment in street cleaning and tackle issues and behaviour around littering, fly tipping and dog fouling amongst others.

“We host and support community clean-ups and litter pick events and encourage our residents to join in this initiative, but please make sure to do so safely under the current Government guidelines around COVID-19.

“We know that the majority of our residents take pride in our borough and through these campaigns, we hope to encourage more to support those initiatives.”