Testimony Regarding LD 349: An Act to Establish a Mattress Stewardship Program

Once each year, approximately 30 30-yard dumpsters are filled to the brim with discarded mattresses, old tires, car parts, and other  items dumped on the land of woodlot owners. This enormous clean-up effort, undertaken by a host of volunteers during IF&W and DACF’s Annual Cleanup Day, only touches upon a fraction of the waste that is illegally dumped.

A bill has recently been proposed that addresses the problem in the form of a discarded mattress stewardship program. Bill Williams, Deputy Executive Director of Maine Woodland Owners, points out that it’s important to “reduce overall waste and reduce the dumping of waste on woodland owner's property,” in his testimony for the bill.