By Will Atwater
On Saturday, March 15, volunteers gathered at sites like West Point on the Eno River, where cool temperatures and gray skies greeted them. Wearing neon-colored vests and armed with grabber tools and trash bags, they spread out — some working in small groups, others on their own — to collect litter.
“We find most litter around parking lots, either because people toss it from their cars or it flies out when they open their doors,” said Rachel Owens, an environmental science teacher at nearby Northern High School. A veteran of cleanup projects for nearly two decades, Owens said she’s no longer surprised by the type of litter she finds, including cigarette packs and plastic wrappers.
Meanwhile, volunteer Derek Ward, a recent transplant from California, collected debris near a stream in another section of the park.
“What strikes me, especially coming from California, is the styrofoam,” Ward said. “We don’t have styrofoam back there. I’m just picking it up and thinking, ‘This is what’s crumbling.’”
The volunteers were out picking up trash as part of Durham’s Creek Week, a collaboration between Keep Durham Beautiful — an environmental advocacy group — and the City of Durham, which ran from March 15 to March 22. Established in 2009, the weeklong event brings together volunteers to clean up local waterways and is part of a statewide effort to raise awareness about their condition.
In 2024, Keep Durham Beautiful, an affiliate of Keep America Beautiful, collected more than 59,000 pounds of litter from “Durham’s streets, waterways and parks” and were assisted by nearly 5,000 volunteers who helped the organization carry out its mission, according to the group’s annual report.
Five decades have passed since the initial anti-litter campaigns of the early 1970s, and since then, researchers have learned that not only is litter an eyesore, but some types of it pose health risks to humans and wildlife. They’ve also learned it’s expensive.
How much does litter cost North Carolinians?
In the 1970s, growing concerns about trash-polluted parks, beaches, roads and waterways led to the creation of two influential public service announcements and, by extension, events like Creek Week.
In partnership with the Ad Council, Keep America Beautiful released a campaign featuring a Native American shedding a tear over the widespread environmental damage caused by litter. The ad carried the tagline: “People start pollution, people can stop it.” Meanwhile, the U.S. Forest Service introduced Woodsy Owl, a cartoon mascot who encouraged Americans to take action with his catchy slogan: “Give a hoot! Don’t pollute.”
While governments spent almost nothing on litter abatement 50 years ago, in 2023, the North Carolina Department of Transportation, local governments and nonprofit groups spent more than $56 million removing litter from the environment, according to the “Cost of Litter in North Carolina” report released this month.
The report was produced by a coalition of state environmental groups, including the Haw River Assembly, Cape Fear River Watch, MountainTrue, Duke Environmental Law and Policy Clinic, and the North Carolina Conservation Network.
One of their primary goals is to highlight who’s picking up the litter tab.
“What we want people to come away with is […] the realization of how much of this burden is falling on local municipalities and nonprofits,” said Nancy Lauer, a Duke Environmental Law and Policy Clinic staff scientist.
“Your average person is really taking on a lot of the cost of litter, either through the fact that a nonprofit they’re involved with, or nonprofit in their area, who could be doing something else with their time is having to focus on litter cleanups,” Lauer said. “That average person is also taking on the cost because of their taxpayer dollars having to go to the city or the state and partially being used for litter cleanup.”
In 2023, the NCDOT, which maintains 80,000 miles of state roadways, spent $25.3 million on litter removal, bringing the total expenditure over the past 15 years to $270 million. This effort removed 12.2 million pounds of trash in 2023 and 139 million pounds since 2009. Including data from nonprofits and other cleanup groups, the total litter removal reached 14.6 million pounds in 2023, according to the report.
Who’s to blame?
Anti-litter campaigns such as the ones produced by Keep America Beautiful and the Forest Service, produced half a century ago, have framed litter as an issue of personal responsibility — suggesting that if everyone simply disposed of their trash properly, the problem would disappear.
While most environmentalists agree individuals play a role, many argue that corporations should be held accountable for the sheer volume of wasteful products they produce — particularly single-use plastics such as shopping bags, food containers and packaging, which are among the most common forms of litter.
Mounting research shows that plastic pollution is not just an environmental issue but a growing health concern. A 2023 Duke University study found a potential link between nanoplastics and a brain protein associated with Parkinson’s disease and some forms of dementia. Other studies suggest links between ingested microplastics and inflammatory bowel disease and hormone disruption. One 2019 report suggests people inhale between 74,000 and 121,000 microplastic particles annually.
“We can reduce litter by reducing single-use items, because if things are meant to be reused, people will be less likely to discard them,” said Tania Dautlick, executive director of Keep Durham Beautiful. “But it also comes down to the individual making sure that things in their yard and their truck beds are secure and not blowing off. And also just being mindful of holding on to your trash until you can find an appropriate place to put it.”
Still, advocates argue the burden shouldn’t fall solely on individuals.
Credit: Will Atwater/NC Health News
“There are industries who are producing infinite amounts of plastic into the world and have no part in recovering that plastic and disposing of it safely,” said Madison Haley, co-producer of the litter report, N.C. State graduate student and former plastics advocacy fellow at Haw River Assembly. “That’s a fundamental issue and an injustice that the people perpetrating the problem aren’t the ones who are taking responsibility for cleaning up in the end.”
“We are inundated with single-use disposable plastic,” said Rob Clark, water quality program manager for Cape Fear River Watch. “Inevitably, when you have such massive production and flooding of our society with a type of litter, it’s going to end up in the environment in a multitude of ways that has nothing to do with individual failure.”
Ultimately, advocates say tackling litter requires a multifaceted approach — one that reduces reliance on single-use plastics and holds manufacturers accountable for their role in the problem.
Fighting back
In 2023, anti-litter advocates were blindsided by a last-minute addition to the state budget that barred local governments from enacting litter-reduction ordinances, including plastic bag fees. The move blocked cities like Durham, Asheville and Carrboro from advancing local bans or restrictions on plastic bags — underscoring ongoing tensions between state and local control.
“That preemption certainly came out of nowhere for advocates,” said Grady O’Brien, water policy manager for the North Carolina Conservation Network. ”[Lawmakers] dropped it in the conference report — the last stop before it becomes law.”
In response, advocates are shifting their focus to statewide solutions outlined in The Cost of Litter in North Carolina report. Recommendations include a bottle deposit program, local litter-reduction initiatives and holding manufacturers responsible through extended producer responsibility policies.
Several bills reflecting these priorities are now in the General Assembly:
House Bill 8, NC Managing Environmental Waste Act of 2025, introduced by Rep. Harry Warren (R-Salisbury), would require state agencies and schools to use compostable or recyclable materials when feasible and would phase out food service ware at select state-run sites.
House Bill 344, introduced by Rep. Kanika Brown (D-Fuquay-Varina), proposes a statewide beverage container deposit and refund program — a key strategy from the litter report.
Senate Bill 20, sponsored by Sen. Bobby Hanig (R-Powells Point), would ban intentional balloon releases with a $250 fine, exempting scientific uses.
Senate Bill 166, co-led by Sen. Sophia Chitlik (D-Durham), seeks to restore local authority over regulating auxiliary containers like plastic bags.
All four bills are awaiting review in their respective chambers.
Opposing perspective
Creek Week and the litter report give environmentalists a renewed opportunity to push for long-term regulatory solutions to a problem that has plagued American society for over half a century — and, some argue, has been accepted as part of modern life.
“It’s not abnormal to go paddling down the river and there’s plastic water bottles caught up in the reeds or floating past you,” Clark said. “As a society, we’ve become accustomed to that and [say] ‘Well, that’s just normal, that’s inevitable,’ but I don’t think it has to be that way.”
There’s broad agreement that litter is a problem, but not everyone supports the regulatory approach recommended in the report.
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“While we all agree that a clean environment and clean water are important to a thriving economy, we differ in the pathway to get there,” said Andy Ellen, president of the North Carolina Retail Merchants Association. “The litter that ends up on roads or in creeks is unfortunately the result of human activity — choosing to improperly dispose of trash rather than use appropriate means of disposal.”
Ellen also criticized legislation introduced in the General Assembly aimed at curbing waste, particularly so-called “bottle bills.”
“NCRMA strongly opposes ‘bottle bills’ such as House 978 in 2024 or House Bill 344 in 2025 as this legislation is essentially a regressive tax on consumers raising the cost of soda by $0.60 for a six-pack or by $1.20 for a 12-pack of beer,” he said. “Because surrounding states do not have a similar bottle tax, this could easily lead to out-of-state consumers bringing their empty beverage containers to North Carolina for redemption. It would also have the effect of removing beverage containers from the recycling stream thereby reducing revenue for local governments.”
While opposing certain proposed “bottle bills,” Ellen said the association supports Senate Bill 207, which strengthens penalties for littering by targeting people whose names appear on pieces of litter — on bank statements, utility bills, prescription bottles and the like — and making them responsible for the trash.
Meanwhile, riverkeepers and environmental groups continue organizing trash cleanups — to care for the environment, improve health and raise awareness. Clark said there’s an open invitation for state lawmakers to join a cleanup and see the problem firsthand.“Every time it rains, those floating trash capture devices fill up with Styrofoam and plastic bottles — without fail,” Clark said. “I’d love to take legislators out there, help us collect data and talk about how they can support their communities — so we’re not just swimming in plastic waste.”
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