The month of April has been designated as a special time to encourage Americans to take greater responsibility for improving their local community environments. Keep America Beautiful Month is a great time for Southwest Virginians to volunteer in ways that will enhance the physical treasures found throughout our region.

Keep America Beautiful, Incorporated is using its annual Great American Cleanup campaign to encourage individuals to “fight dirty” to improve their communities. Each year during the Great American Cleanup, millions of volunteers mobilize to prevent litter and graffiti while promoting beautification and waste minimization in their communities.

Every spring, the Great American Cleanup campaign is organized and held from the month of March through May. This year more than 3 million volunteers will participate in 30,000 cleanup events in 17,000 communities nationwide.

Keep America Beautiful, Incorporated is a national, nonprofit, community improvement and public education organization. The group works to form community partnerships with the goal of engaging individuals to take responsibility for caring for their physical surroundings. Since 1985, Keep America Beautiful has been leading the Great American Cleanup program, which is just one of its many programs to encourage voluntary participation in caring for communities in the United States.

This year’s Great American Cleanup is expected to involve volunteers working to clean and beautify community areas such as playgrounds and recreational centers as well as rivers, lakes, and shorelines.

Last year, these volunteer efforts added up to more than 6.7 million work hours, reducing the need for tax dollars to finance cleanups. Last year, the Great American Cleanup effort resulted in 86 million pounds of litter and debris removed from landscapes, including 6,500 illegal dump sites and more than 15,000 abandoned vehicles.

Additionally, participants planted more than 100,000 trees and created more than 38,000 gardens and green space areas. As part of the effort, more than 144,000 miles of roadway were improved along with 91,000 acres of parks and public lands and 6,000 miles of hiking and biking trails.

Below are just a few of the suggestions that Keep America Beautiful has developed that individuals can use to clean up and beautify their communities.
•     Work with the  local civic groups to identify and eliminate eyesores, and beautify the  local environment.
•     Pick up a piece of  litter every day.
•     Write a  letter to the editor of your local newspaper asking others to respect  public lands and keep them clean.
•     Help your  local schools conduct recycling drives and clean-up projects.
•     Create a  beautiful green space by planting trees and shrubs in an area in need of  improvement.
•     Paint and fix  up playground equipment.

To learn more about the Great American Cleanup campaign, please visit the Web site for Keep America Beautiful, Incorporated. The Web site can provide useful information to individuals and groups residing in Southwest Virginia who are interested in participating in the Great American Cleanup to protect and enrich the natural wonders which abound in our region.

Rick Boucher is Congressman for the 9th District of Virginia, which includes the New River Valley. You can catch his Capitol Commentary regularly at the New River Voice.