Earth Day 2020: Memphis, Nashville amid 15 Big, Litter Cities

by S. SPACEK litterscorecard.com TWITTER@litterscorecard

April 20, 2020 - Memphis and Nashville are two Tennessee communities among the USA’s 15 Biggest, Litter Polluted Cities, where littering and dumping of potentially virus-breeding waste is visible, widespread. This information comes as people celebrate the 50th Earth Day April 22 during the coronavirus outbreak, said Steve Spacek, director of the American States Litter Scorecard and a public performance specialist.

Tennessee’s two biggest urban centers, along with Indianapolis, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Philadelphia, Houston, San Antonio and Fort Worth---communities with lesser CDC-noted Covid-19 case totals, and Detroit, New Orleans, New York, Miami, Los Angeles and Baltimore--CDC case “hotbeds,” make for the 15 cities with 375,000-plus populations, Spacek said. Choices were made using indicators from published sources, including the U.S. Census Bureau, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NTHSA), municipalities and reports by Busy Bee Cleaning, TRAVEL+LEISURE and Forbes.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency and revered health science journals, solid wastes are able to breed and transmit fatal viruses and diseases--Tetanus, Hepatitis A, Malaria, Zika, even Covid-19, said Spacek. As wastes, cigarette filters, paper food packaging, plastic beverage containers and retail -issued bags can enter waterways, then ate by seafood caught and sold for human consumption. World newscasting concurs the coronavirus developed last November from diseased animal remains sold with impunity at “open-air” markets in Wuhan, China, he said.

Data from the NHTSA Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) indicates over 800 persons have died each year since 2010-- roughly 3 Americans killed per day-- from vehicular-majority encounters with un-removed waste and related debris upon roads, sidewalks, trails and in parks. These life-ending incidents, reported exclusively to NHTSA by state police agencies, can occur anytime and under all types of weather, Spacek said.

Since the first Earth Day in 1970, five decades of Gallup polls find “a majority of Americans have great concern for pollution and its management by government,” said Spacek. “The cities of Memphis and Nashville are big-time failures to citizens. Elected city and county officials, workers, contractors acted lax. Filthy public spaces were not cleaned. Little to no waste reductions, almost zero support to reuse and recycle thrown-away items. Sadly, as highly-littered communities, Memphis and Nashville appear to be paying ultimate prices for not duly practicing Green virtues: avertible deaths.“