These workers keep Old Orchard Beach’s coastline clean

OLD ORCHARD BEACH — The alarm sounds at 3:45 a.m., earlier than most beachgoers will ever see their beloved shoreline. But for Fred Hoyt, that's just the start of another morning keeping Maine's most visited stretch of sand clean.

At 66 years old, Hoyt is one of three seasonal workers hired by the town to patrol all seven miles of Old Orchard Beach, picking up trash before the first tourists emerge from their oceanfront motel rooms. He started the job last year, his second season on the crew.

"I've always worked in public works," Hoyt said, recalling his decades-long career as a garbageman in New Jersey before retiring in 2018. He and his wife relocated to Maine two years ago to be nearer to their daughter, who recently gave birth to their grandchild.

The job felt like a natural fit. The hours are early, but he enjoys the solitude of the pre-dawn beach. Palace Playland's rides sit dormant, the arcade is empty, and no vendors hawk fried dough. Just waves and his earbuds playing the Grateful Dead.

As the sun breaks over the horizon, Hoyt paused to capture the moment with his phone.

"That's my shot," he said.

His daily routine involves walking three to four miles along his assigned stretch west of the pier, bucket in one hand, long grabber tool in the other. He zigzags between early-morning joggers and seagulls, filling his bucket with items visitors leave behind. Occasionally, he finds toys that are still intact—he washes them, tucks them into a reusable Hannaford bag he carries, and donates them later.

On a recent morning last week, his haul included a pink acrylic nail, a white plastic fork, half a paper plate, a length of mint green dental floss, and a single black ankle sock. He keeps a running tally of cigarette butts, the most abundant form of litter he encounters. The previous day, he counted 379.

Cigarette filters take centuries to decompose, and they shed microplastics into the sand and water. Yet they remain the most common遗弃物 abandoned on the beach.

The job's biggest challenge isn't the early alarm or the weight of a full bucket. It's confronting the carelessness.

"It's seeing how people don't care," Hoyt said, his shoulders sagging momentarily. "That's what hurts the most."

Bottlecaps, a pile of 16 cigarette butts, an abandoned boogie board, beer cans buried rather than binned—these are the daily disappointments.

"Why?" he asked, dropping a banana peel into his bucket. "There's really no need for it. You know you're going to the beach. Bring a garbage bag."

Jaime Conte, who manages administrative operations for the town's public works department, understands the pressure. Old Orchard Beach draws heavy summer crowds precisely because of its reputation—pristine sand, seven miles of accessible shoreline.

"We're a very touristy town," Conte said. "People come for that seven miles. They pay a lot of money to stay at these hotels all along the beach. The expectation is that it needs to be clean."

State tourism data supports that assumption. Roughly one in five visitors to Maine spends time at a beach, according to a state Office of Tourism survey.

But the town's resources are stretched thin. Conte said she'd prefer to hire eight workers to cover the full beach each day. Instead, three employees handle the workload, picking up extra slack this season amid staffing shortages. The pay is minimum wage, with no weather exemptions and weekends required.

Nearby Scarborough and other coastal towns assign similar duties to seasonal park rangers or beach attendants, who also rake the sand when conditions allow and birds aren't nesting.

Community volunteers occasionally supplement the town's efforts. The Surfrider Foundation organized a cleanup in Old Orchard Beach on July 5, gathering 86 pounds of trash left by holiday crowds.

By the time Hoyt finished his route just after 6 a.m. on the morning described, the first beachgoers had already arrived—staking umbrellas, spreading towels, claiming their chosen patches of sand.

The beach was clean for them. It would need to be cleaned again tomorrow.

For Hoyt, the work continues—three and a half months, sunrise to finish, every single day.