Published April 23, 2021

MELROSE — Earth Week 2021 in Melrose promises to be a great celebration of the city’s 10 years as a green community. One exciting and creative new initiative debuting this year is the litter letter project.

Organized by Keep Melrose Beautiful volunteers along with a cross-section of municipal departments, the litter letter project provides a great way for citizens to visualize waste in their community, spawning greater awareness and action.

On April 23, the eve of the Earth Week community cleanup, artists will unveil a series of 5-ft. tall letters spelling the word “REDUCE” located at the corner of Lynn Fells Parkway and Tremont Street.

The letters, made of mesh wire and PVC pipes, will be hollow receptacles into which volunteers can deposit the littered bottles and cans they recover in the cleanup, scheduled for Saturday, April 24.

Melrose photographer Jack Welch has been hard at work building the letters, working from a design by Follow Your Art Community Studios director Kris Rodolico. Welch measured and cut each PVC pipe then connected them with pipe joints to form the letter shapes, one in front and one in back, before wrapping the mesh fencing around them.

“It was a good way to give back,” says Welch, who worked in HVAC and pipefitting before retiring a few years ago. He is volunteering countless hours to the project.

Welch consulted with Melrose DPW on how to best anchor the giant letters in the ground, keeping them both weather-resistant and accessible to volunteers.

Melrose’s litter letters are the second such effort organized by a Massachusetts community, following the lead of Sherborn, which first brought the project to the commonwealth early this spring.

The litter letter project was the brainchild of artist Rachael Hatley, who launched the idea for Keep Louisiana Beautiful in 2013. Since then, it has spread to several countries and 15 states, each showcasing the results of roadside cleanup efforts with tangible calls to action. Hatley says, “By displaying these large-scale visual messages in public places, the hope is to provoke response, thought and action. The litter letter project is a way to begin the conversation.”

When Keep Melrose Beautiful co-founder Demi Dubois learned about Sherborn’s litter letters, she was moved to incorporate the project locally and began contacting artists and fellow volunteers to brainstorm. She received a grant from the Melrose Messina Fund for the Arts to cover the cost of supplies.

“I thought this would be a great way to pair artistic expression and environmental awareness during Earth Week,” says Dubois. “We need to find creative ways to prevent litter from accumulating in our streets, while finding smarter ways to reduce the plastic, glass, and aluminum we use.”

Keep Melrose Beautiful organizes efforts year-round with scores of residents participating from among the several hundred in its Facebook group. To participate in the cleanup on April 24, Melrose residents can sign up via the city’s Earth Day website: https://www.cityofmelrose.org/mayor/earth-week-2021.