The transition ahead has been brewing for months, according to Carter County Proud founder Ed Jordan.
After months of coming together to help address litter issues within the community, the organization recently found it would receive adequate funding to pursue being part of Keep America Beautiful (KAB) – a national organization that offers grant opportunities and other items to help beautify communities within the county.
Carter County Proud will look at what’s ahead during the first meeting of the new year, scheduled for Wednesday, Jan. 18, at the SmokeHouse BBQ Company, located on Milligan Highway near Happy Valley High School, at 6 p.m. The public invited to attend the meeting.
“Since the funding has been received, the topic on the agenda will be discussing tasks involved in our affiliation of Keep America Beautiful to become Keep Carter County Beautiful,” Jordan said.
Carter County Proud was able to gather $2,000 each from the city and county governments that will be used for the $4,000 application fee to be part of the Keep America Beautiful.
“It’s all about education,” Jordan said. “The benefits of being part of Keep America Beautiful will only help the community. Our goal for the new year is to continue educating the community and look at ways to address the issues to help keep the community beautiful.”
“As Carter County Proud volunteers, we accomplished a lot of our goal of education, enforcement and cleanup of our community in 2016,” he continued. “In this upcoming year, we still have a lot of work in front of all of us toward our mission.”
While cleanups will be discussed during the upcoming meeting, Jordan announced the organization will hold its quarterly Tennessee Department of Transportation Adopt-A-Highway Cleanup on Saturday, Jan. 21, at 10 a.m. on Milligan Highway. Individuals wanting to participate in the cleanup are encouraged to meet at the Happy Valley Elementary School parking lot a few minutes before the start time.
“We encourage anybody that wants to get involved to come on out,” Jordan said. “We’re going to look at getting with other organizations to see if they want to adopt a highway and have these types of events over the year. It’s a great thing to be part of and we always appreciate the help of the community that comes out and helps during the day.”
For more information on the organization, individuals are asked to visit the Carter County Proud Facebook page online.