To help make orange even more green, the Freshman Council presented a bill that will ban taping down paper advertisements on campus sidewalks, pathways and bridges at its meeting last week.
Cameron Landers, undecided freshman and council representative, said passing bill FROSH-02-08 would be just a small step to keep the campus clean. “The goal here … is campus beautification,” he said.
It is not a matter of the paper itself, Landers said, but the residue it leaves behind.
“Most of you guys have seen a lot of on- and off-campus advertising programs doing this,” he said. “They take papers and duct tape them down. Well, when it rains, the paper washes away and leaves a tape square that does not look good. This legislation will stop this from happening.”
Enforcement of the bill is different for on- and off-campus organizations. The bill said on-campus organizations must “immediately remove” fliers on sidewalks, or the organization could be reported to UT police and face littering fines.
“Once they are reported, it is up to the UTPD on how they choose to discipline the offenders for littering,” Landers said. “In most cases, I speculate, this would be a request to remove the advertisement or be faced with a fine.”
Off-campus organizations’ enforcement follows the same guidelines of removal and fines, but the bill gives staff members the opportunity to throw the advertisements away.
“Staff members can tear them off at will,” he said.
If the bill passes Nov. 29 at the Freshman Council’s next meeting, Landers said there would be an announcement through the weekly student@Tennessee newsletters. He said this will be a way for on-campus organizations to learn about the new rules about advertisements on campus.
Associate Dean of Students Ron Laffitte said such a rule is not part of the university yet.
“Ideally students would want to keep campus beautiful,” Laffitte said. “If they just pay attention and pick up trash then campus would be clean.”
If the bill passes it will be sent to the Student Senate where representatives will vote on it. From there, if approved, it will be sent to Dean of Students Maxine Thompson who will then send it to the appropriate administrator. Once the bill goes through these channels, Laffitte said it will be added into Hilltopics, the student handbook.
Facilities Services is responsible for cleaning university grounds. Mike Sherrell, executive director of Facilities Services, said there is already a policy for posting political and commercial items around campus. According to the Facilities Services Web Site, “The posting and/or distribution of political and/or commercial signs and handbills is not permitted in campus buildings or on the grounds of the university. General bulletin boards may not be used for such postings.” From there Sherrell said any item posted in other places will be removed, and there will be costs if there is damage.
However, he said he does not remember an instance when there was damage caused by removal.
“We take the stuff down so fast, in a lot of cases people realize that this is a waste of time and money,” Sherrell said.
Additionally he said there is no procedure in place for the UTPD to fine someone in the manner of the bill.
“The police have to catch the people in the act,” he said.
Capt. Keith Lambert said in an interview last November that there are only a few litter citations issued each year. He said it would be very difficult to have officers watch for littering because it would undermine the UTPD’s job protecting students.
