Shreveport man spends mornings cleaning up neighborhood trash

SHREVEPORT, La. (KSLA) — Calvin Horton spends a couple of hours some mornings cleaning up trash that people leave behind in his neighborhood.

“This is my grip and grab; this is where I store all of my tools to pick up the trash,” Horton said.

Horton says he has lived on 76th Street since the 1990s. He says it is a neighborhood with good people but one with a lot of leftover waste.

“Let me show you. This is the kind of stuff that’d be on the side of the road, and it’ll just be there, you know, stuff like this. So I’ll pick it up, you know,” Horton said. Asked if he picked up the items that morning, Horton said yes. Asked whether the trash would still be there if he had not picked it up, Horton said, “I think it would still be there.”

A community effort

Horton says he is not the only one who volunteers time to fix up the area. He calls it a community effort.

“Young men that observe me often, and they see me out working, and so they aren’t afraid to come to me and ask me, you know, can they make a few dollars with doing something? And so I tend to help them, and they work out good,” Horton said.

Horton says it is a job he believes they should not have to do so often.

City’s response

The city’s Public Works Department says it understands where Horton is coming from but says it is not responsible for handling smaller pieces of trash. The department instead focuses on larger collections.

“This is not a dumpster. This is not a landfill. You know, and it’s where we live,” a Public Works Department representative said. “In my opinion, I think with trash being picked up, it makes the community look safer. So I kind of encourage the citizens, or the people who live in this area that show a concern when they see trash on the ground or something to that effect.”

A 2021 proposal would have increased penalties for littering and illegal dumping in Shreveport. That ordinance was later withdrawn.

Horton said people who commit crimes take comfort when they see trash on the ground.

“I feel like, you know, criminal-minded people tend to cater when they see trash and glass splattered on the ground and cans and paper. They feel a sense of comfort because they feel like nobody else cares. And so if we live over here and we care about where we live, we want to keep our area looking as good as we can,” Horton said.

Horton says he does not mind doing the work. He said a cleaner Shreveport can help curb crime.