Leflore County has a litter problem.
The question for those troubled is how to solve it.
Volunteers with Keep Greenwood and Leflore County Beautiful met on Wednesday at the Greenwood-Leflore County Chamber of Commerce building to discuss putting the solution together.
Elected officials and concerned citizens attended to address what has become an unsightly nuisance in the community.
“We’ve been talking about it. We’ve been meeting about it. It’s past time to seriously do something about it,” said Reginald Moore, president of the Leflore County Board of Supervisors.
Scheduled for the week of April 17-22 will be a cleanup week to address the litter issue. Both Moore and Mayor Carolyn McAdams said it will take a community effort.
Highway litter can be attributed to people driving through, but litter in neighborhoods should be considered unacceptable to the community, the mayor said.
McAdams said the city and the county do not have the resources to cover all aspects of the litter problem.
Moore went further, citing District 5 Supervisor Robert Collins. “Every time a piece of trash is thrown out, it’s costing money. Because somebody has to come along and pick it up.”
He said last year, volunteers spent two days canvassing the county to develop an average measure for how much litter was in the county, with a score of 1 being “pristine” and a score of 4 being “very littered.” Overall, Leflore County has a score of 1.77.
With the index completed, the next step was to organize action.
Beth Stevens, the chamber’s executive director, invited residents to sign up as cleanup volunteers on their own at volunteer.kab.org. Keep America Beautiful will then mail a litter kit with trash bags and gloves.
Moore and Brandice Williams, a teacher at Amanda Elzy High School, expressed support for visiting schools and getting children involved in cleaning up their communities.
Marcellus Gray, a community activist, suggested rallying neighborhoods to keep their communities clean all year.
Moore and Stevens said that a panel of volunteers will be working over the next few weeks to spread the word on how the overall community effort to clean up the county will be organized.
- Contact Kevin Edwards at 662-581-7233 or kedwards@gwcommonwealth.com.
