Lee County Earth Team Volunteer Heads Up School Yard Cleanup

By Liesa Simpson*, Lee County Earth Team Volunteer, Auburn, Alabama

Trash is commonplace on public rights-of-way and highways in Lee County and across the state of Alabama. The problem of litter is worse than ever before.   The problem with litter especially hit home when my own piece of the county was affected. The Beauregard School campus is where I drop off my 10th grade son daily. It got to the point that I just couldn’t drive onto the campus and look at the trash anymore. My children heard the exclamations of horror every time we approached the school. It literally ruined my day. My teen became dreadful when I dropped him off at school for fear that I would stop a teacher and comment on the state of the grounds. My first idea for remediation was to clean up the campus myself with the help of some friends, but the area is more than we could take on alone. The final solution came later as I visited the Parent Teacher Organization (PTO) in December 2007, and proposed the Clean Campus Program and our group’s assistance with the clean-up events.	Before	Before
	I’m sure that this picture of roadways covered in litter is familiar to everyone in Lee County and quite possibly the State of Alabama, but we got it cleaned up. The success of the clean-up is obviously.  On Monday, when I dropped off my son at school, I took these pictures… what an accomplishment!
	After	After

The PTO members agreed that the litter problem needed to be addressed. The Principal agreed to register for the Clean Campus Program and the PTO registered for the Adopt-A-Mile Program in honor of the High School.

Before I left the meeting, we set the date to clean the campus for December 15th. The success of the meeting was inspirational.

Two weeks later we met at the school and joined a group of parents, students, and the principal for a very rewarding clean-up event. The students and parents armed themselves with bags and litter sticks provided by Lee County PALS (People Against a Littered State) and set to work. With twenty-seven people in attendance, the campus was returned to a dignified state in less than two hours.

The results were out of this world. It is my resolve to assist students, parents, teachers and concerned citizens in litter awareness and constructive actions in correcting the problem for themselves and everyone in their community. In this case, it just took someone setting the stage…

Many thanks to everyone who volunteered to make Beauregard a Clean Campus.

Liesa Simpson
Lee County Earth Team Volunteer
and Lee County PALS Vice President
P.O. Box 2654
Opelika, AL 36803-2654
www.LeeCountyPALS.org 
email: liesa.simpson@gmail.com

*Liesa Simpson was the Natural Resources Conservation Service Alabama State Outstanding Earth Team Volunteer in 2006.  She helped establish the Annual Lee County Water Festival in 2004 and served on the Water Festival Leadership Committee each year. She is working on the planning of the 5th Annual Lee County Water Festival in May 2008.

< Back to Success Stories