Carrollton, We Really Cleanup Up!

On Saturday, Keep Carrollton Beautiful, with the help of it’s dedicated Board of Directors, the Carrollton Evening Lions Club, City of Carrollton and 300 volunteers - cleaned the whole community. If you were out for the beautiful day, you probably saw teams of volunteers picking up trash out in fields, green belts and along creeks and train tracks. The numbers aren’t in yet but they filled a half of a 30-yard dumpster!

This was Keep Carrollton Beautiful’s fifth annual Great American Cleanup / Don’t’ Mess With Texas Trash-Off and the event awareness has been building steadily. The kids and their committed leaders from Girl Scout Troop 1348 and Boy Scout Troop 114 are veteran volunteers for this event; helping with the planning each year. Keep Carrollton Beautiful’s Teen Advisory Board members pitched in to bring community service organizations from both Hebron and Creekview.
Making “mass feeding” possible is the Carrollton Evening Lions Club. Swarms of gold vests could be seen carrying grills, cooking and passing out hot dogs to the hungry volunteers.

“Our in-kind donors make an event this large possible. Without Cadbury-Schweppes, Albertson, United Party Rental Center, Allied Waste Services, Frito-Lay, Tom Thumb and Trinity Medical Center, we would not be able to accommodate the trash and our volunteers,” said Sharon Goddard.

Environmental Educators provided games, specimens and demonstrations - informing everyone. Many were surprised to learn how long it takes to decompose everyday trash, like 75 years for disposable diapers, 10-12 years for cigarette butts, and NEVER for styrofoam.

The participants also learned about how they can create their own Backyard Wildlife Habitat to provide migration corridors for birds. Beneficial Aquatic bugs were on display. There were “found” natural specimens from the Elm Fork Nature Preserve. And a stormwater Enviro-Scape showed everyone how pesticide run-off from your yard can pollute creeks and lakes.

During the Great American Cleanup, Keep Carrollton Beautiful not only holds this event each year; but assists groups cleaning all 6 Adopt-A-Spots, schools with Earth Day Celebrations, and a Trinity River cleanup in Carrollton. This year many schools and neighborhood groups also cleaned.

“What we notice is that the railroads aren’t very good neighbors. They are responsible for trash along their own tracks, but that’s where we pick up the most,” said the Director.

The City of Carrollton is deciding how to fund Keep Carrollton Beautiful right now. Please let your City Council person know how important you think their programs are. Keep Carrollton Beautiful wants to continue to provide you with a place to plug into the community.

If you’d like to see how you can help or have a project in mind, go to www.KeepCarrolltonBeautiful.org or call 972.466.2121. Thank you to everyone who came out to the make the Great American Cleanup a great success!
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