UC Berkeley to clean streets on students' summer break

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, May 19, 2007 | by Doug OakleySTAFF

BERKELEY -- It's become an annual ritual: When many of UC Berkeley's 18,000 students leave town for the summer, some inevitably leave couches, televisions, clothes and sundry other items strewn all over city streets.

Now for the first time, the university and city of Berkeley are joining forces to clean up after them. Starting last Wednesday, they are providing Dumpsters, extra trash pickups, a special recycling station and a trash hot line staffed by university workers.

UC-Berkeley also has a hot line, (510) 643-5309, for people to report piles of trash that the university promises will be picked up within 48 hours of a call.

The $30,000 cleanup effort will focus mainly on the south side of campus, but Dumpsters will be available on the north side as well, said Irene Hegarty, director of community relations for UC Berkeley.

In all, about 25 Dumpsters 12 feet long will be dropped in spots out to Derby Street on the south side and up to Cedar Street on the north side.

On Saturday and Sunday, and again the following weekend, a recycling center will be set up in the North Street parking lot on the Clark Kerr campus just off Derby Street.

The university printed 7,000 door hangers listing ways students can get rid of their trash, from making donations to selling clothes to dropping off items at the special weekend recycling center, Hegarty said.

"We've committed $20,000, which will cover most of the Dumpsters and the (dump) fees," said Hegarty. "We're still working out the details on the extra trash sweeps, which will happen probably a couple of times a week."

Hegarty said the university got involved in cleaning up after its students when the city stopped picking up after them.

"We've had increasing complaints," said Hegarty. "A lot of students think if they leave something curbside, someone will pick it up. But often that doesn't happen, so it becomes an environmental problem and a neighborhood problem."

City Councilmember Kriss Worthington, whose district includes the south side of the UC campus, said he is "guardedly optimistic" about this year's plan. Worthington got the city council to spend $10,000 on the cleanup effort.

"I've been asking for over a month, and we still don't have answers to what are the locations of the Dumpsters," said Worthington. "My thought is we should let people know where they are."

Worthington also wondered why the 7,000 door hangers printed by UC Berkeley did not include the trash hot line number. He said that despite a few glitches he is happy the city and university are teaming up.

"Personally, I think the university should pay the whole cost, but since that hasn't happened, having the city contribute $10,000 seems to be working as an incentive for the university to get going," said Worthington.

E-mail Doug Oakley at doakley@ebdailynews.com.