Editor’s Note: This article contains language some may consider offensive.
Residents of State Street and tenants from the surrounding area want the Baton Rouge and University community to know their neighborhood is not a trash can.
Kasey Ball, Ivanhoe Street resident and education junior, helped organize what she called a “Carlotta Street Cleanup” on Saturday to help clean some of the trash off the streets.
Residents cleaned the streets and the sidewalks but not the corporate canal that runs behind the area.
“We need to get local people to go the city and speak to the councilmen. That way we can get the canal cleaned because it is the city’s job and they should be cleaning it every other month,” Ball said.
Ball said the city has tried to clean the canal, but the backflow from its filth was too much for the bridge. The bridge is now structurally unsound as defined by federal law.
Two cement roadblocks now cut off the bridge that runs through Carlotta Street and will continue to do so until the canal is cleaned as scheduled in December 2011, Ball said.
The roadblock allows for only one exit out of the neighborhood, Ball said.
“It’s scary to me that our only out in this neighborhood is on State Street,” said Carlotta Street resident Tina Ufford, who said she is inconvenienced by business traffic and  traffic from home football games.
But with a community effort, Ball and residents hope to push the canal’s cleaning date to something they feel is more reasonable.
“When I called [the Department of Public Works of Baton Rouge], they came and said it was something they were going to fix but not until December of next year, and I feel like that is bullshit,” Ball said.
Before Ball and surrounding residents go to the city and demand their neighborhood canal be cleaned sooner, they feel the neighborhood must be more presentable.
Residents can’t ask the city to maintain a neighborhood they don’t maintain themselves, Ball said.
“We all live here. We all don’t like trash, and this is disgusting,” Ball said to about 30 people who gathered Saturday to clean the litter in the streets.
The purpose of getting together was for the neighborhood to have a collective voice, Ufford said.
“I feel like I have to step up. In the five or six years I’ve been around here, there’s more new people here than there ever have been,” Ufford said.
The residents of State Street are in constant transition because students move in and out a semesterly basis.
“It seems like we’ve become really apathetic because of the way our neighborhood is just used,” said Carlotta Street resident and anthropology senior Genevieve Jones.
The State Street area is home to several popular events like the    Carlotta Street block party, said Ivanhoe resident John Freeman.
“There are all kinds of awesome stuff coming out of this area, things that draw people in,” Freeman said. “The biggest party in the city and of the year is here. There is Ivanhoe Fest, which is a bunch of fun for local artists, and it’s all free.”
The neighborhood is a viable venue, Freeman said.
However, visitors who attend the events tend to leave the place trashed.
“Nobody here is your momma. We don’t mind partying with you like your momma, but we’re not going to clean up after you like your momma,” Jones said.
The cleanup was sponsored in part by Jeremy Dellafiora, a landlord who owns three buildings on State Street and 14 apartments in the area.
“I love this neighborhood,” Dellafiora said.
Dellafiora believes the little bit of money and time he has donated is nothing compared to the residents who want to take pride in their neighborhood.
Another cleanup has already been planned and scheduled for Oct. 16.
“We’re going to create a petition to clean the canal, get street lights, sidewalks and speed bumps,” Ball said.
 
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Contact Julian Tate at [email protected]