By Staff
KEEP AMERICA BEAUTIFUL Keep America Beautiful Chairperson Betty Lou Jones, holding the microphone, talks about the Great American Clean Up at a news conference Thursday. Listening are Meridian Mayor John Robert Smith, left; Patty Swearingen, KAB board member; Beverly Knox, KAB coordinator; Connie Royal, Meridian Council for the Arts executive director; and Wayne Rawson, Meridian Council for the Arts president. Photo by Kyle Carter/The Meridian Star
special to The Star
April 2, 2004
Betty Lou Jones, Keep America Beautiful chairperson, made the announcement Thursday in front of Meridian's City Hall.
Joe Norwood, president of the Lauderdale County Board of Supervisors; Connie Royal, executive director of the Meridian Council for the Arts; Patty Swearingen, MSU extension service county director; and Beverly Knox, Keep America Beautiful coordinator for Meridian/Lauderdale County, were also on hand to encourage residents to join the fight against litter and debris in neighborhoods.
Volunteers interested in making the community a cleaner and safer place to live can pick up trash bags and gloves at the KAB office in Meridian City Hall. Volunteers from churches, community development clubs, Boy Scout and Girl Scout troops, students and other community organizations also can participate in the clean up.
Volunteers are not just limited to picking up litter. Planting flowers, painting or just helping to clean up around an elderly person's home are also suggestions for the Great American Clean Up.
This weekend's Arts in the Park will be a litter-free event.
Organizers said banners will be hung throughout the park to remind people to properly dispose of their litter. Volunteers will hand out litter bags at ticket booths and other various locations during the two-day festival.