Keep Smyrna Beautiful wins national, state awards

Keep Smyrna Beautiful has won several national and state awards. At the recent ceremony were (l-r) Keep Smyrna Beautiful Board Member Ed Planksker, Keep America Beautiful President & CEO Helen Lowman, Keep Smyrna Beautiful Executive Director Janet Liberman and Keep Smyrna Beautiful Coordinator Julie Barwig. (Courtesy of Smyrna)

Keep Smyrna Beautiful has won several national and state awards. At the recent ceremony were (l-r) Keep Smyrna Beautiful Board Member Ed Planksker, Keep America Beautiful President & CEO Helen Lowman, Keep Smyrna Beautiful Executive Director Janet Liberman and Keep Smyrna Beautiful Coordinator Julie Barwig. (Courtesy of Smyrna)

Keep Smyrna Beautiful officials recently were recognized at the state and national levels for their work in 2019.

KSB received the 2019 Keep Georgia Beautiful Affiliate Award, 2019 Governor’s Circle Award, 2019 Keep America Beautiful Award, Affiliate Award of Sustained Excellence and the President’s Circle Award.

With a “special thank you to all of our volunteers, members, donors and sponsors in 2019, we truly can’t do this work without your support,” said KSB Coordinator Julie Barwig. “Whether it’s with your time or your donation, we hope that support continues into 2020.”

Celebrating its 35th anniversary in 2019, KSB last year:

  • raised $20,000 in beautification grants for Smyrna schools;
  • sold 12,450 jonquil bulbs for plantings around the Jonquil City of Smyrna;
  • diverted 35,180 pounds of paper from the landfill with document shredding;
  • collected 13,180 pounds of litter;
  • cleaned 110 miles of roadways, trails and waterways;
  • monitored seven local streams for water quality;
  • 515 bags given away at litter-free events.

For 2019 among the volunteers, there were 1,798 volunteers; 4,900 volunteer hours; 24 volunteer projects and $124,607 in value from volunteer hours.

So far this year until the March shutdown due to the coronavirus pandemic, there were:

  • 4,565 trees chipped at Bring One for the Chipper;
  • 57 trees adopted through the Adopt-a-Tree program;
  • one Japanese BloodGood Maple was planted on Arbor Day in front of the Smyrna Public Library;
  • 2,640 of litter were picked up during the January Adopt-a-Mile litter cleanup;
  • 265 volunteers have given their time in 2020.

Information: ksbinc15@gmail.com, facebook.com/KeepSmyrnaBeautiful, instagram.com/KeepSmyrnaBeautiful, twitter.com/KSBSmyrna