Spring Blight Reduction Efforts Kick-off with the Great American Clean-up
While Saturday’s annual spring clean-ups didn’t go exactly as planned, overall the many youth and adult participants made the best of an unfortunate weather situation and some good progress on giving back to the community. It was all part of Keep America Beautiful’s Great American Cleanup, the nation’s largest community improvement program, which takes place annually.
Keep Greater Milwaukee Beautiful, a local non-profit, sponsors GAC locally which involves an estimated 3 million volunteers and attendees nationwide. Nationally, volunteers donated more than 5.7 million hours in 2010 to clean, beautify and improve more than 33,000 communities during more than 30,000 events in all 50 states and beyond. Activities included beautifying parks and recreation areas, cleaning seashores and waterways, handling recycling collections, picking up litter, planting trees and flowers, and conducting educational programs and litter-free events.
Milwaukee residents hit the streets and alleys on Saturday, April 16th. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate and a dreary and cold day prevented many from joining in. However, for those that did, including hundreds of Marquette students, no time was wasted and plenty of work was completed.
Safe & Sound participated and sponsored numerous events across the City. Safe & Sound Community Partner Aaron Edwards held a clean-up at one of our funded Safe Places, the Silver Spring Neighborhood Center, in coordination with the Westlawn Block Watch / Resident Council. Talibah Mateen worked with the Dominican Center and area resident groups to clean-up the neighborhood around 21st & Hadley. Rose Pritchett held a community cleanup with the Parklawn YMCA youth and residents. Al Hegwood assisted Gracelyn Wilson, organizer for the Northwestside CDC, on a beautification event in the Century City neighborhood. Maria Sandoval was on the Southside and coordinated a community clean-up with the United Community Center, also a Safe & Sound Safe Place. These are just some of the activities that took place on Saturday and many of the events included Marquette student volunteers from their annual Marquette Hunger Clean-up.
Some got a head start on the weekend festivities. On Thursday April 14th, 50 students from James Madison High School Youth Leadership Initiative cleaned up 100 bags of garbage and numbered 15 garages in the neighborhood south of Florist Ave between 78th and 84th Streets before the weather turned too cold and they were forced inside. Despite the unfortunate conditions the JMAC Youth Leadership Initiative in conjunction with the Milwaukee Police Department, Safe & Sound, and the neighborhood block watch is making great efforts to improve the neighborhood, strengthen their relationship with the community and improve the atmosphere at the school.
It is only the beginning of the season, and efforts to get residents working together, communicating concerns, and taking pride in their communities will continue all summer long.
