ANCHORAGE – With a lot of the snow gone it's hard to miss all the trash around town.
Melting snow piles are leaving behind all the garbage people dropped during the winter.
This year the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce pushed back its annual citywide cleanup because of the heavy snow load.
According to Chamber President Sami Glascott, last year crews picked up about 600,000 pounds of garbage.
She said that's down from years past when volunteers would pick up over one million pounds.
“Actually, every year it gets less and less, and that is our goal,” said Glascott. “We're trying to teach stewardship, trying to teach people to actually cover their loads so there's actually less trash on the roads each year.”
The orange cleanup bags will be handed out Tuesday at Fred Meyer stores in Anchorage and Eagle River.
The city is urging people to wait until the week of May 12, when the official clean up begins and taking the bags to the dump will be free.
