After stumbling upon ‘Keep Newnan Beautiful’ in a Facebook Event, Anderson & Associates was CURIOUS to say the least!
If you’re anything like the girls on our team, we are constantly looking for ways to be more involved in the City of Homes that we live in and Coweta County in general. Once we found out a little more information on what Keep Newnan Beautiful was and all it had to offer, we jumped on the opportunity to help such an amazing organization. This blog post was created to inform you of ways that YOU can keep Newnan Beautiful as a small business or organization and as individuals!
Below you’ll find answers from Keep Newnan Beautiful’s director, Page Beckwith who does a tremendous job at organizing the events we’ll talk about below and managing several projects in order to make our City of Homes a more beautiful place.
What is the concept of Keep Newnan Beautiful? How was it created?
Page: Keep Newnan Beautiful was first created as the Clean and Green committee in 2003 to assist the City in keeping the City clean from litter, trash, and debris. In 2006, City Council deemed it in the best interest of city residents and property owners to create a commission to assist the City in keeping the City clean from litter, trash and debris. The Commission completed the certification with Keep America Beautiful and became Keep Newnan Beautiful. KNB consists of 12 members that are appointed by the city council. Each commission member must live within the Newnan city limits. Keep Newnan Beautiful’s mission is to educate, empower, and motivate the residents of Newnan, Georgia to take greater responsibility for improving the local community environment through litter prevention, beautification, and waste reduction. We are a non-profit organization, funded primarily through city taxes, that works to inspire and educate all residents of our community toward greater environmental stewardship.
When I first called Page to find out about this organization, one of the first things she mentioned was the opportunity to Adopt A Street! It just so happens that East Broad Street heading toward downtown had just become available to adopt! (How lucky are we?!) We are now the proud owners of that street (from the roundabout all the way to the train tracks) and clean it about every 2-3 months! We love it! It adds a mix up to our work day and gets us outside in the fresh air! The “thank you’s” from Newnan citizens that you hear yelled out the car just melts your heart and makes picking up the trash WELL worth it!
Page: Keep Newnan Beautiful currently has 52 adopted streets and we are in the process of completing renewals and swapping street locations! Our Adopt A Street program is a wonderful and easy way to give back to the community. We request that your street be no less than 1 mile long, you pick up the road at least 4 times a year, and report the trash collected back to the KNB office. KNB supplies all of the trash bags, gloves, safety vests, and grabbers to the “adopters”. We also send our trash crew to pick up the bags once they are filled. After completing the initial cleanup, KNB will order a sign to display on the roadside to notify residents who is helping keep that stretch of road clean. It is a great public relations activity for any business or civic group. We also have families that do it as well.
As a small business or organization, or even a large family, I HIGHLY recommend adopting a street within your city limits. It has done wonders for our business and what better way to show your community that you care about them than keeping their streets clean?
If Adopting A Street is not up your ally, here are other ways that you can help Keep Newnan Beautiful as an organization:
Page: We have recently started a beautification program that consists of a Pollinator Garden and a Community Orchard. We are always looking for sponsors to help in the gardens and/or donate items to be planted or used in those locations. We recently received a grant from Niagara Bottling and plan to start construction on an Outdoor classroom that will be located behind the Pollinator garden. We will have several opportunities for people to assist with putting this project together. We also have plans to “upgrade” a local playground later in the fall or early 2019. The playground area will have lots of opportunities for sponsorships.
As individuals and children, what are some small changes that the citizens of Newnan could make that would help Keep Newnan Beautiful?
Page: Recycle Properly! One of the biggest issues facing the recycling community today is contamination. Just throwing something in the recycling bin because you think it should be recycled doesn’t mean it is getting recycled. In fact,it can contaminate the ENTIRE load of recycling and cause it all to be thrown away. Glass for example~ the city’s contractor Waste Industries does not take glass in the curbside bins. If you put glass in the blue curbside bins, you are contaminating the “load” and the ENTIRE truck will have to be thrown away, which defeats the purpose of recycling in the first place. Plastic grocery bags are another culprit.
We have started several recycling events that give residents the opportunity to recycle and properly dispose of hard to recycle items. We also host events to help mark the storm drains with reminder stickers that tell people “only rain goes down the storm drain”. We host educational classes on recycling, water education, importance of pollinators, composting, and various ways to prevent pollution. We would love to come present to your group.
Here is a list of what is acceptable and not acceptable for our recycling bins.
How can we get our kids involved?
Page: KNB accepts volunteers of all ages~ we only ask that if they are under 16, they be accompanied by an adult. Bring them to one of our recycling events in downtown or to one of our gardens to participate in our activities.
Let your children sort out your recycling. Recycling container should be free of food debris and liquids. Cans and plastic bottles can be crushed once emptied to allow for more space in your bin.
Let them start a composting pile. This does take some adult assistance, but can be a FANTASTIC way to reduce waste and gas omissions. KNB office is happy to supply information on composting.
Be sure to follow their website and follow Keep Newnan Beautiful on Facebook!
Click here to learn more about the events coming up with Keep Newnan Beautiful! If you would like to learn more about composting or would like more information on how you can be a part of any of these amazing projects, you can contact Page at pbeckwith@cityofnewnan.org.
We hope this helped give some insight as to how YOU can help keep your home city beautiful!
Chelsea Knox with Anderson & Associates at Keller Williams Realty Atlanta Partners