You mom told you to clean up after yourself. Thursday, the Jefferson County Commission is going to take care of that responsibility for folks who didn’t learn that life lesson.

During their committee meeting Tuesday, commissioners moved to the agenda of Thursday’s meeting a resolution to increase the cleanup fee paid to locations that are used as precincts for elections.

If it passes, the fee the county pays will go from $250 to $500.

“When we have a big election, like a presidential, we have huge turnouts at a lot of our precincts,” said Barry Stephenson, chairman of the Board of Registrars. “The garbage overruns, the use of the bathroom facilities, parking. This is (us) just trying to give a good faith effort to our precincts and thank them and keep them.”

Stephenson has often attended commission committee meetings for requests to change precinct locations because that location no longer wanted to host voters. Most of the county’s precincts are in facilities such as churches and community centers.

“We’ve increased it so it makes it worth their time and effort,” he said. “I wish all our voters were tidy and neat and didn’t litter, but that’s not true across the whole county. Someone at that facility’s got to empty the garbage cans.

“They have to mop the floors (and) they have to clean the bathrooms the next day or that night,” the Board of Registrars chairman said. “This is our way of just trying to help the facilities, help those facilities we use as precincts, and thank them also.”