WDHN ON YOUR SIDE - ONE SLOCOMB RESIDENT TIRED OF PICKING UP TRASH

Another `18 on your side report...this time from the town of Slocomb, where one man is tired of picking up trash in his yard that comes from a store just across the street. Dennis Smith owns a service station in Slocomb, and has lived on North College Street for ten years. He says every day it is the same...he picks up trash in his yard in the mornings, goes to work by day, and picks up trash again at night. Not because he wants to, but because he has no choice. He says, "most of it we get from the grocery store...you can walk through this yard most anytime and pick up receipts, cups, where people just throw it down, but the biggest complaint I have is when I pick it up in the evenings, when I come out the next day, my yard is full again." Smith lives across the street from the Slocomb Market Plaza, a chain of numerous stores as well as the Slocomb Marketplace which is a grocery store, which he says is where the majority of the trash comes from. He`s talked to numerous managers throughout the years, and says for a few months the trash stopped piling up in his yard, but it didn`t take long before it was back. He says, "they hired a company truck called vaccusweep..it came in nights and ran through the lot, and during that time, there were no problems. I talked with the manager and he told me that they were going to call and get that started up again, but his supervisors stopped him...said it cost too much money." The Slocomb Marketplace store manager told us they sweep their parking lot every night, and do everything they can to keep their store clean. He also said that when one lives across the street from a big chain of stores, you can expect to see some trash. When WDHN told Mr. Smith about the store managers comment regarding sweeping the parking lot every night, he made a challenge to Slocomb residents to keep an eye on the situation, saying they may sweep now that this story has made air, but says it won`t be long before things go back to normal.