Reubin aims to clean up Highway 41

Published 3:27 pm Tuesday, September 3, 2019

This Saturday, Dallas County Commissioner Valerie Reubin is continuing her effort to clean up Dallas County by organizing a group of volunteers to tackle the trash along U.S. Hwy. 41.

The garbage along the roadside recently came to Reubin’s attention after the grass was cut along the road, making the abundance of trash all the more apparent.

Reubin travels the road quite frequently on her way in and out of the city of Selma, so passing by the piles of trash so often lit a fire under the commissioner to do something about it.

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“I just hate to see it like that,” she said. “It really looks bad over there.”

While some of the trash is definitely the result of litterbugs, Reubin believes the main source of rubbish that plagues the roadsides of U.S. Hwy. 41 blows off of improperly secured trucks on their way to the nearby landfill.

“There’s cans and bottles and stuff,” she said. “But a lot of it looks like it didn’t come from average citizens.”

Though it’s a state road, the highway technically isn’t in Reubin’s district. That hasn’t stopped the citizens of District 1 calling to tell Reubin about the unsightly condition of the road.

“Plenty of people have called to tell me how bad it looks,” she said.

While Reubin has already secured some help in eradicating the highway of trash, more volunteers are certainly needed.

Reubin encourages anyone who wants to see Dallas County clean to meet her and the other volunteers at Richard’s Cougar Oil on Highway U.S. Hwy. 41 on Saturday morning at 8 a.m.

After an early start, the group aims to work until 11 a.m.

“We’re going to split up, go down both sides of the road and clean up as much as we can,” said Reubin.