Skip to content

B.C. mayor publicly shames driver who threw Taco Bell bag out car window

Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart took to Facebook to remind people how much littering costs cities
16267936_web1_BLANK-SPACER650x1

A B.C. mayor didn’t pull punches when he spotted someone throwing a fast food bag out of their car window.

Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart was driving down Lougheed Highway on Tuesday when he watched the driver of a white Acura RDX ahead of him throw their Taco Bell drive-thru bag out of the SUV.

Stewart, who pulled over and picked up the garbage, expressed his hate for litterbugs, going so far as to include the driver’s partial licence plate.

“I will drop off your garbage and your full licence plate number with bylaw enforcement. You can pick it up there, or they can deliver it to your home address (though they might have some paperwork for you),” he wrote.

He went on to point out that litter and illegal dumping costs Coquitlam residents thousands of dollars each year.

The post has been shared nearly 400 times in two days, garnering a lot of praise for “naming and shaming” those who are environmentally unconscious.

It may be uncommon for a politician to publicly shame someone for littering, but it’s done every day on reportlitter.ca. The four most recent posts there are about incidents in Port Coquitlam, Kelowna, Maple Ridge and Burnaby.

Littering can land you a $115 fine through the provincial Litter Act, and municipalities will have their own fines. In Coquitlam, littering gets you a $250 ticket, while dumping larger garbage is a fine as high as $500.


@ashwadhwani
ashley.wadhwani@bpdigital.ca

Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.



About the Author: Ashley Wadhwani-Smith

I began my journalistic journey at Black Press Media as a community reporter in my hometown of Maple Ridge, B.C.
Read more