Seniors Shoulder Cleanup Of Litter Along Highway 195

Senior citizen Jeanne Wennes stepped carefully along a steep highway embankment, collecting litter in the name of community service.

A tumble, and the 64-year-old Wennes easily could have been injured.

But that didn’t deter her. She had a job to do.

“I love to be productive,” said Wennes, a retired schoolteacher. “I’ve wanted to do volunteer things for a long time now.”

Wennes was one of 10 members of the South Hill Senior Center who cleaned litter last week along the Pullman Highway just south of Interstate 90.

Members of the senior center patrol a two-mile stretch of U.S. Highway 195 under the state’s Adopt A Highway program.

Some of the litter gets snagged in the bushes and trees along the highway. Wennes worked her way into a stand of small birch trees, struggling to stay upright on the loose footing.

She stuffed litter into a plastic garbage bag supplied by the state highway department and climbed back to the top of the bank.

“It’s dirty,” she said. “You don’t know what you will find.”

She could have been at home drinking coffee or watching television.

Instead, she and the others were working and enjoying each other’s company while traffic roared by at 60 mph.

“Our people want to get involved in something that’s not self-serving but serves the community,” said Jack Stallcop, a member of the senior center board.

Stallcop and his wife, Mattie, are among the more senior members of this group. Both are 81.

“We have a lot of fun,” he said. “You’d be surprised.”

“We wave to the truckers,” said Jean Atteberry, organizer of the cleanup.

The state provides a large orange sign used to warn motorists that a litter crew is on the shoulder of the road. Stallcop’s job is to set up the sign and then move it as the litter pickers move down the highway.

To reduce the strain on the seniors’ backs, the group uses poles with spikes on the end for stabbing litter.

Occasionally the seniors come across hazardous litter, such as syringes or broken glass. They are supposed to tag the items with a red ribbon for highway crews to clean up.

For the most part, the litter runs the gamut of soft-drink cups, cans and packing material.

The filled trash bags are left along the side of the highway for state crews to collect and dispose of.

The volunteers clean their adopted stretch of road three times a year.

During the work on Oct. 1, the group included Atteberry, Kathleen Barbour, Larry Beck, Greg Kitley, George Ross, the Stallcops, Ray Tomlinson, Mary Wakeley and Wennes.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo