On Saturday, it was a beautiful day and Keep Carrollton Beautiful volunteers made sure our streets, parks, greenbelts, streams and lakes are even more beautiful now! Spending their own free time in community service, 270 volunteers collected 9,740 pounds of litter and debris from 34 sites in Carrollton. “We had individual volunteers and scouts and schools and churches and neighborhoods this year. They focused their amazing ‘can do’ attitudes to plan, set up, collect trash and break down our event. We could do nothing without their beautiful spirits.” said Sharon Goddard.

The Don’t Mess With Texas Trash-Off event was a grassroots partnership with Keep America Beautiful, Keep Texas Beautiful and the Texas Department of Transportation – with 340 affiliates cleaning all over Texas. All of America should be looking pretty good today!

Locally, the Trash-Off was Keep Carrollton Beautiful’s sixth annual participation. The event is just one of many activities they host or empower during the three month Great American Cleanup. Keep Carrollton Beautiful is working with many schools, neighborhoods and corporate teams to supply smaller events during this time.

Thanks to Albertsons at Josey and Keller Springs and at Old Denton and Hebron the volunteers didn’t go away hungry. Albertsons thinks that “it’s important to be good neighbors and give back to our communities…..to improve all of our lives”. As a great corporate citizen, they have supported Keep Carrollton Beautiful since its inception in 2004. “I hope that the citizens of Carrollton won’t let this valuable asset get pushed out of our community by stiff competition” said the director of Keep Carrollton Beautiful.

Dr. Pepper Snapple Group’s representative, Bill Kirkland, has also been supporting Keep Carrollton Beautiful since its beginning. “We (DPSG) have a proud, longstanding heritage of caring … for our consumers, our customers, our employees and our neighbors in the communities where we live and do business across the United States… caring is at the heart of our business, shaping our values and the importance we place on corporate social responsibility…” Dr. Pepper really helped out at the Trash-Off making sure none of the hard working volunteers went thirsty.

Keep Carrollton Beautiful could never accommodate so many volunteers without the loyal and enthusiastic support of the Carrollton Evening Lions Club. These Lions are some of the community’s most steadfast local servants. Their website says “When it comes to meeting challenges, our response is simple: We serve…in regions battered by natural disaster, in schools and in eyeglass recycling centers, Lions are at work, helping, leading, planning and supporting…We want everyone to see a better tomorrow…we support vision screenings, eye banks and eyeglass recycling…We believe everyone deserves a healthy life…providing health programs for hearing loss, diabetes prevention and improving the health of children and adults around the world.” “Our Carrollton Evening Lions Club lovingly cooks the best hot dogs in Texas! And always with a smile.” said Sharon Goddard.

Thanks to the many volunteers, this year’s Trash-Off was a roaring success. The people involved know who they are and are very much appreciated. If you’d like to help Keep Carrollton Beautiful, go to their website www.KeepCaroolltonBeautiful.org and join.

Another fun way you can help is by bidding on their Don’t Mess With Texas Trash-Off On-Line Auction. The auction will raise funds for their programs and you can still bid through April 8.
###END###

Carrollton, Texas –
Keep Carrollton Beautiful’s at it again; this time they are expanding their sixth annual Great American Cleanup to include all environmental efforts (i.e. cleanups, spruceups, refurbishments, garden building) everywhere in Carrollton and morphing their event to the Don’t Mess With Texas Trash-Off being held all over Texas. “We wanted to take advantage of all the national and state media going out during March 1 through May 31. We’re just part of a much larger effort” said Sharon Goddard, Executive Director of Keep Carrollton Beautiful.

Last year, 2309 Keep Carrollton Beautiful volunteers spent 8,743 hours collecting 6,700 pounds of litter and debris from green belts, streets, parks, rivers and shorelines in Carrollton. They also had fun educating 2,000 participants about Backyard Wildlife Habitats, beneficial aquatic bugs, natural specimens at Elm Fork Nature Preserve, and stormwater run-off. Keep America Beautiful’s Great American Cleanup is the nation’s largest community improvement program, involving an estimated 3-million volunteers. In 2008, the hardworking volunteers donated more than 6.7 million hours to clean, beautify and improve more than 17,000 communities during more than 30,000 events in all 50 states and beyond.

It’s Spring cleaning time! Join us on April 4, 2009 from 9:00 am to 1:00 pm picking up litter and whatever else your school or neighborhood would like to tackle. Keep Carrollton Beautiful is there to help you with supplies and camaraderie. The Don’t Mess With Texas Trash-Off is an annual event that encourages Texans across the state to join forces to clean up Texas roadsides, shorelines, greenbelts, parks, school campuses and neighborhoods.

Everyone can participate! Volunteers from all walks of life – students, business leaders, civic organizations, individuals, families, churches, community groups, sororities, fraternities, sports teams, the military, etc. will be volunteering. If you have some from free time, please volunteer and make a difference. Just go to www.KeepCarrolltonBeautiful.org and register.

Your participation sends a message to Texans everywhere that the smallest efforts really do make the biggest difference. Take pride in the fact that you were part of making our great state beautiful! Join the Don’t Mess With Texas Trash-Off event and help make a difference!

“Hands-on participation is key to encouraging sustainable attitudes and behaviors toward the environment,” said Matthew M. McKenna, president & CEO of Keep America Beautiful. “Great American Cleanup national events represent significant volunteer efforts to make major improvements in a single day. The size and scope of these events shines a national spotlight on activities that are happening in communities from coast to coast.” Hat’s off to all who volunteer to keep Texas beautiful.

In conjunction with their event this year, Keep Carrollton Beautiful is hosting another On-Line Auction to raise funds for their programs. You can preview the items starting on March 22 and bid from March 25 to April 3. Just go to their website and click on the Don’t Mess With Texas On-Line Auction button.

***END***

Keep Carrollton Beautiful is a catalyst and community liaison making Carrollton a cleaner and more beautiful place. Keep Carrollton Beautiful is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, dedicated to engage Carrollton to enhance our community environment.

Since 2004, we have held 50 public events utilizing 7,930 volunteers. Our programs channel energy and money into community improvement in partnership with Carrollton’s public, private and civic groups. Our leadership is a volunteer Board who work in all aspects of the community.

Sharon is a third generation Carrolltonite who has spent the last five years creating community in Carrollton. She believes:

“America is in a crisis. We’re in a very Un-American jam. We are doing a very poor job educating all our children; the drop-out rate is very high — with the weather changing in much of the world to flood and/or drought; the devastation of global warming is getting clearer — the unemployment rate is raising the numbers of ‘working poor’.

All the change we need is in the average citizens’ hands. Historically, citizen leadership is the only way anything in America has ever changed. Everyone needs to do their part at home and at work. It’s up to all of us to be the best of America.”

Carrollton, Texas –
Keep Carrollton Beautiful is celebrating its fifth birthday!  “Our five year numbers were amazing.  I’m so proud that we’ve come this far.  I told the City Council I feel like ‘The Little Engine That Could’.  We did!” said Sharon Goddard, founder and executive director of Keep Carrollton Beautiful.

They had a great party to honor past and present board members, supporters and dignitaries in December.  Then they awarded 5 year service certificates to their longtime donors.  At the February 5th council meeting, Sharon presented the City of Carrollton’s Leonard Martin and Mayor Ron Branson with a plaque recognizing their support through the Community Service Assistance Grant since 2004.  Keep Carrollton Beautiful will also be awarding Sam Pack Five Star Ford as well.  Since they are a 501(c)(3) non-profit, their work would not be possible without grants, sponsorships and members.  Donations are tax-deductible.

In only five years, Keep Carrollton Beautiful has engaged 7,930 individual volunteers in community service!  That’s a lot.  They have channeled $149,078.37 in in-kind donations and $95,494.05 in cash into the City’s economic development.  They provide supplies and funds for environmental education, community events and environmental projects.

Among other accomplishments, Keep Carrollton Beautiful has collected 51,131 pounds of litter off the streets and greenbelts of Carrollton.  They have diverted 288,440 pounds of recyclables and reusables from the landfill.

Keep Carrollton Beautiful, with the help of Keep Texas Beautiful, Keep America Beautiful, Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, Environmental Protection Agency, North Central Texas Council of Governments and Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission, distributes environmental education materials to event participants, schools and businesses.  “How else are the lofty federal, state and city environmental goals ever going to get to the individuals who can do something in their own lives to make them a reality?” said Sharon.

Your next opportunity to get involved is the Great American Cleanup from March 1st to May 31st.  They are hosting another On-Line Auction from March 25th to April 3rd.  And their Don’t Mess With Texas Trash Off event is April 4th.  During the three months, they will sponsor library displays, school Earth Day celebrations, neighborhood cleanups and corporate river cleanups.  Go to www.KeepCarrolltonBeautiful.org for more details.

If you have any ideas for a project that will improve the community, please call Sharon at 972.466.2121.  Keep Carrollton Beautiful’s answer is always “Yes1”.  �
***END***                  

Keep Carrollton Beautiful is a catalyst and community liaison making Carrollton a cleaner and more beautiful place.  Keep Carrollton Beautiful is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, dedicated to engage Carrollton to enhance our community environment.

Since 2004, we have held 50 public events utilizing 7,930 volunteers.  Our programs funnel energy and money into community improvement in partnership with Carrollton’s public, private and civic groups.  Our leadership is a volunteer Board who work in all aspects of the community.