‘Quality of life’ a serious issue for Pageland

I took a walk recently, but felt like I was touring a crime scene. Here’s the evidence I observed scattered along the roadside:
An Applebee’s “to go” cup.
A gnawed-on corndog stick.
Hamburger wrappers scattered from a torn paper bag.
A hubcap mangled by an industrial-strength lawn mower.
A pair of underwear.
About 5,000 cigarette butts.
You can learn a lot about your community just by taking a walk. For example, it’s safe to assume that some people in Pageland live hectic lifestyles that require them to sometimes eat their meals “on the go.” It’s either that, or there are a lot of people who believe this town is their personal trash can.
I’m not sure how we can correct this problem. Cops have enough to do without creating “stings” for litterbugs (because we do have more pressing problems), which requires us to use an honor system. And it’s no great observation to say that a few of us don’t have any honor.
I’m kind of surprised there hasn’t been a widespread corporate effort to discourage littering. Most corporations, whether its McDonald’s or Suncom, have very strict policies on how and when their logos can be used in advertising. They can’t possibly be happy with seeing their logos printed on roadside trash, particularly when there is food involved.

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If I could bring anything to Pageland, it wouldn’t be a new restaurant or retail business — it would be a veterinarian.
There’s a demand for this kind of service in every town, and having a vet would also go a long way toward improving the quality of life in Pageland.
Unfortunately, there is a lot of competition for vets today, and new graduates are faced with large student loans to repay and have to follow the money. Today, this trail almost always leads to big cities and big animal hospitals. The days of the small-town veterinarian are probably behind us, thanks to the changing economy.
But it’s not a lost cause. We’re close enough to the Charlotte market to possibly convince an animal hospital to open a part-time office in Pageland, but to do that we’d need someone working full-time to conduct economic recruiting. Our chamber of commerce spends much its energies planning the Watermelon Festival, which doesn’t leave time for much else during the course of a year. And bringing a vet to Pageland is probably not a priority for countywide economic development.
So we have a task that is too big for the town, and too small for the county. It makes me wonder what else is slipping through the cracks.


Wallace McBride is editor of The Progressive Journal. He can be reached at wmjournal@shtc.net.