Community cleanup program a success

A new Borough clean-up program has led to about 360 tons of trash being removed across 18 private properties. That’s according to Jason Ortiz, Mat-Su Borough Deputy Director of Planning and Land Use. He aims to make the program more robust and inclusive of more services.

Not only has the current program helped clean up the community, it also led to collaborations within and outside the Borough. Those relationships will ultimately help the Borough provide better services. Ortiz says residents who call to report an issue are sometimes shuffled to another agency or department, making the process inefficient and frustrating.

One example is trash in roadways. Ortiz says the Borough is developing a memorandum of understanding with the Alaska State Department of Transportation and Public Facilities. Residents won’t have to guess if their road is maintained by the Borough or the State.

“I think having an MOU with the State will allow us to act quicker and the State will be able to throw some resources, money, more importantly, for us to do the work faster on their property and their rights-of-ways.”

One of the parcels cleaned up this year benefitted from the diversion program, still in the development stage with the Palmer District Attorney’s Office. This program will be a way for offenders to provide community service. 

About 18 Borough-owned parcels are also in need of clean-ups. Those parcels fall under the authority of Community Development. Junk car removals and rights-of-way trash fall under the Solid Waste Division. Ortiz has a proposal to bring these programs together.

“I am proposing that we get this full-time position and get these part-time positions and take over all of it so that way we can then try to manage a program through private property clean-ups. Through a diversion program. And really grow the diversion program by working together with the State and the Department of Law, grow the diversion program and then see all this successfully cleaned up and just a cleaner community.”

Ortiz says he has requested $221,000 for the upcoming fiscal year budget, excluding the junk car program. He says if that program continues it will have a separate budget. But that it would make sense to be included in the larger community cleanup program.

The public can provide input on the clean-up and other Borough programs during the Assembly’s spring budget hearings.