Banishing Bathurst Butts – Reducing CBD Litter

MEDIA RELEASE 21 December 2020

Council has received grant funding from the NSW Environmental Protection Authority to butt-out Bathurst’s cigarette litter problem.

Banishing Bathurst Butts is a behaviour change and educational project that will install butt bins and signage at CBD project sites with significant butt litter. A proactive approach will communicate positive social norming through a social media blitz, strategic advertising and signage, media communication and enforcement.

Discarded cigarette butts have over 400 harmful chemicals that when littered leach into our natural environment and waterways causing a range of impacts. Research from the NSW Environmental Protection Authority has indicated that approximately 1.32 billion butts are littered in NSW each year. Through preventative projects in public places almost 800 million can be prevented from entering the environment.

Mayor Bobby Bourke said checks completed by Council’s Environmental Officers found large quantities of unlawfully discarded cigarette butts in the CBD area.

“Public transport terminals, parking infrastructure, thoroughfares, and entryways to shopping centres were areas of significant butt littering. Across six sites a total of 3,548 butts were observed as littered on the ground, in garden beds and in gutters,” he said.

“It is also worth noting that areas are cleaned regularly by Council. Using this data, it was conservatively estimated that across the projects CBD sites more than 1,176 butts are littered per week,”.

Banishing Bathurst Butts aims to increase binning rates by 50% and decrease CBD cigarette butt litter by 70%. Council would like to encourage all Bathurst community members to engage with the project on social media and help establish a zero-butt litter expectation throughout our CBD.

ENDS

Media contact: Media Officer