On most days, you can find David Boudinot walking in his Fernwood neighbourhood, pail in one hand, litter-picker tongs in the other.
He doesn’t have to wander far to fill his 15-litre pail with trash.
There seems to be a never-ending supply of disposable cups and lids, fast-foot wrappers, bits of Styrofoam, cigarette butts and, lately, face masks. He scoops them out of street gutters and from bushes and hedges along roadways and around parks and playgrounds.
Since Dec. 13, he has collected 360 litres of litter, Boudinot said. “And that’s just west Fernwood.”
Boudinot has created a grid of the entire neighbourhood from Yates and Shelbourne streets over to Cook Street, and he is determined to do it all. And then start over again.
It started in June as a pandemic project when the University of Victoria librarian and father of two young kids, ages 5 and 8, began working from home. Now it’s a mission to make his neighbourhood a nicer place to live.
He documents everything on his Twitter account, which has about 450 followers. He has lots of support, although some people express surprise that he does it for free, on his own time.
“It’s a personal challenge, and it’s easy enough for me to do,” said Boudinot, 41. “Rather than complain about it, I wanted to do something. Everybody likes a clean neighbourhood. It’s positive for the environment.
“I wanted to take that energy and do something that benefits everybody.”
Along with removing the ubiquitous butts, Starbucks and Tim Hortons cups and plastic straws — and the occasional shoe, mop head and hub cap — Boudinot has collected hypodermic needles, a nasty-looking combat knife, a rusty straight razor and even a flare gun.
He turns the dangerous items in to Victoria police and deposits needles in safe boxes.
For larger pieces dumped on the streets, such as mattresses and sofas, he calls city staff for pickup.
And then there are the happy finds.
In October, he retrieved a laptop computer from a city trash bin as he was emptying a load. Boudinot traced the computer to a family in Mission and a University of Victoria student who had it stolen on campus a few weeks earlier. He turned it over to campus security, which reunited the laptop with its owner. “She really needed it to do her online studies,” said Boudinot.
Last week, he found a box containing old photos, tea cups and ceramic Chinese spoons. He posted the photos, including images of a Chinese woman and man, on Twitter. Within a day, Victoria Coun. Charlayne Thornton-Joe had re-posted them on her own Facebook page and another focused on the Chinese community in Victoria.
Within hours, she was getting messages from people who recognized the woman. That day, she was in touch with the woman’s daughter. It turns out that the woman in the photographs, which were taken in China decades ago, had lived in Fernwood for some time, but passed away three years ago. The box is thought to have been misplaced or taken while the family was cleaning out the house.
“The daughter was so thrilled to have the photos again,” said Thornton-Joe. “And I told David that what he found really made their Christmas and New Year very special this year.”
Thornton-Joe likes to think of Boudinot as one of many good citizens helping to keep neighbourhoods clean.
“I see many people that do this,” she said. “The other day in Beacon Hill Park, there was a couple with a bag picking up garbage. I see people downtown, where there are cans every block and [litter] in between. … I see them pick something up and put it in the cans.”
A city official said most public trash bins are emptied daily by civic crews — two or three times daily in some high-traffic areas. The city has also installed 25 “zero waste” bins downtown and in urban villages, where trash can be separated into garbage, recyclables and compostable items. Another 20 are coming in spring, pending budget approvals.
Victoria has 900 street litter cans and another 300 in city parks, and empties them using three garbage trucks seven days a week — two during early mornings and two on an afternoon shift.
A member of the advisory board of the Surfrider Foundation Canada, which is working to eradicate plastics from beaches and waterways, Boudinot is particularly concerned about cigarette filters washing through drains to the ocean and the increase in disposable face masks, which can pose a danger to wildlife, entangling birds, bats and other animals.
Boudinot is hoping apartment owners can help in the cigarette filters cleanup. Since smoking is forbidden in most multi-unit dwellings, residents often go to the street or parks and leave their butts behind.
