As Gov. Paul LePage and his ilk not only look forward to our now-arriving tourists as do all the businesses that will enjoy their buying all the items for sale along with the restaurants, stores and gas stations and this is all good.

A minority of tourists who come to visit our pristine state, however, proceed to trash our roadways. I know they probably don’t do it at home, but up here and particularly in the rural area, some of them do.

As an example, take my town of Somerville. Yes, once in a while we will see a discarded coffee cup from a local store. No excuse; we all err sometimes.

But since our town lies 30 or so miles in any direction to a McDonald’s, Burger King or Wendy’s, why do motorists wait until they are here to discard their trash from these establishments?

When we eat out at these restaurants, we always use their trash bins, why don’t the travelers through our town? I know it’s tourists because we never see those restaurants’ trash except in summer.

I ask them to do the right thing and keep our state in the pristine state it was before they came to visit. We appreciate their business but merely ask that they deposit their trash in proper receptacles.

Frank Slason

Somerville

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