To get a person to take action, you usually need to set an example for them to follow. Elizabeth Gehrman sets an example for people by picking up litter off the streets in Boston wherever she goes. She refers in her article how she is following the footsteps of former Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis, who has been a one-man cleaning crew during his years (and demonstrates to the public of taking action of picking up litter).
- Article: When it Comes to Litter, Let’s be More Like Mike (Dukakis), by Elizabeth Gehrman, of The Boston Globe
She then later discusses about the amount of roadside litter that has decreased since 1968 (61% was what the nonprofit Keep America Beautiful has calculated), but how there is still about 51.2 billion pieces of litter laying around in parks, walkways, and roads in America. It is up to the individuals to take action of picking up litter to make their location pleasant, or let litter lie around in the public eye.
