By Romy Stephens
A pair of Healesville residents hope their newly formed group will help tackle the issue of litter in the Yarra Valley and surrounds.
Cindy DeLuca and Kylie Shorter have founded No Reason 4 Rubbish, a group designed to connect like-minded people that want to keep the region litter-free.
Before joining forces, the pair both regularly volunteered their time to collect rubbish. It was only recently they connected through social media and created an official group.
Ms DeLuca said her passion for rubbish collecting was born through a desire to retain the beauty of her local town.
“I really just hate seeing litter, I love where we live,” she said.
“It’s a beautiful place to live, why would you want to spoil it, there’s no reason for it. We don’t need to have this beautiful valley spoiled by people littering.
“It’s just so inviting coming into a town where it’s pretty and there’s no litter. It’s the first impression when you go anywhere.
“I think it is important for tourism and for people that live here to start to appreciate where they live.”
Ms Shorter said litter was a growing issue, not just in the valley.
“I’ve lived in the Yarra Valley for probably the last 10 to 15 years and I’ve just noticed a growing trend of the litter that’s being discarded in our region,” she said.
“It’s not just Healesville or Yarra Glen, it spreads right out to the Dandenong Ranges as well.”
She added that the most common litter items she collected were cans, beer bottles, cigarette packets and plastics.
“We now pick up a lot of masks too, they are becoming the new plastic,” Ms Shorter said.
No Reason 4 Rubbish now has over 200 members and an eye-catching logo for the group has been created by Brad Charman from Yarra Valley signs.
Ms DeLuca and Ms Shorter hope to create stickers that can help towards raising awareness and education – one of the most important aspects of their initiative.
They also hope to work with Yarra Ranges Council, Melbourne Water, Parks Victoria, VicRoads and the EPA to establish more bins in parks, more local clean up days and more signage to state that littering is a crime.
Despite still sourcing funding, the group is up and running and anyone interested can get involved.
To find out more about No Reason 4 Rubbish, visit the group on Facebook.
