Staff Report
The more than 1,000 volunteers for Keep Eunice Beautiful had a workforce value of more than $170,000, according to Donna Baltakis, director of Keep Eunice Beautiful.
Baltakis presented an annual report at Tuesday’s city Board meeting detailing the efforts of 1,155 volunteers.
She also presented a certificate of appreciation to Mayor Scott Fontenot and Alderwoman Connie Thibodeaux for the city’s efforts.
“Ms Donna has done a fantastic job,” Fontenot said.
Thibodeaux urged business to become involved Keep Eunice Beautiful.
Baltakis’ report includes the following.
“To inspire and education people to take action everyday to improve and beautify their community environment” — This is the mission of Keep Eunice Beautiful since we started in 2012.
I am the volunteer director and we have a volunteer advisory board. We report to the mayor and our efforts are in litter abatement, beautification and recycling. We work with the Eunice Bulb and Blossom Garden Club, schools, churches and businesses. We are an affiliate in good standing of Keep America Beautiful and Keep Louisiana Beautiful. We have been the recipient of the KAB Presidents Circle Award, KLB’s Circle of Excellence Award and I have personally been named the Director of the Year for our state.
Volunteerism is at the heart of Keep America Beautiful. With the help of volunteers and program participants, Keep Eunice Beautiful has annually delivered an average of over $170,000 in measurable benefits to our Eunice community with nearly 8,000 volunteer hours involved in our many events throughout the year.
Everything we do, a litter cleanup at a local park, or school, beautifying an entrance way into town, planting and maintaining downtown gardens, helping to expand recycling, educating the next generation of community stewards, is powered by volunteers who support our programs and mission.
Keep America Beautiful’s Great American Cleanup is the largest volunteer clean up program in our nation.
For the last three years we have worked with 20 to 30 local businesses during the month of April. We ask them to put our logo in their window showing that they support the Great American Clean up and Keep Eunice Beautiful. We ask that they clean up around their business or office and report what they did on a postcard at the end of the month.
This past April we have had remarkable results of 940 pounds of litter being cleaned, 410 pound recycled, 10 new gardens, 48 plants/flowers or shrubs planted and one tree planted. This one event alone had 26 volunteers and 3744 volunteer hours with a total value of volunteer time of $92,400 with $300 of in kind donations giving us a cost benefit ratio of $727.12, and that was just one event during the Great American Cleanup.
We also worked with schools and churches as well in massive cleanups all around town like the Community Clean Up with New Hope Fellowship Church, a cleanup project with the Martin Luther King Community Organization, and with the Eunice Bulb and Blossom Garden Club to keep Second and Park cleaned and the plants and gardens maintained. We will offer supplies to any group to help them if we can.
America Recycles Day
America Recycles Day (ARD), a Keep America Beautiful national initiative, is the only nationally-recognized day dedicated to promoting and celebrating recycling in the United States.
Each year, on and in the weeks leading into Nov. 15, thousands of communities across the country participate by promoting environmental citizenship and taking action to increase and improve recycling in America. In Eunice we are involved with the schools, as well as LSUE, and reach over 1200 students and recycle nearly 4000 pounds of materials.
The Litter Index conducted as part of the KAB affiliate development, provides a baseline which we can use to determine if littering behavior is changing. The Litter Index is an annual requirement for Good Standing conducted at approximately the same time each year. The report requires you to enter the location and total score for the Area on a scale of 1-4, with 1 being the worst case. We travel 50 neighborhoods in all four Council wards as well as tour entrance ways.
The scores have been pretty stable over the years, however the trouble spots seldom change and that is disappointing.
Our work with Mr. (Bill) Thompson in code enforcement however has helped a lot in changing some troubled areas. Through our Litter index we give addresses to Mr. Bill and those are many of the properties he brings to you to take care of. He also helps to address the areas we see of overgrowth, dumping and abandoned buildings or homes. Together I feel we have made an impact on blighted areas and encouraged home and business owners to better care for their properties.
And Keep Eunice Beautiful has just been awarded two grants from Keep Louisiana Beautiful.
Next month we will receive four trash receptacles for downtown, each worth $500, and we also received the Clean-up Supplies Affiliate Grant which gave us 100 litter grabbers, 100 safety vests, 100 gloves, 100 T-shirts, and cases of trash bags, all worth $4,000. This saves the city money and we can supply our volunteers to continue doing cleanups around town.
We still have our work cut out for us, but we cannot give up. Every step forward, as small as it may seem, is still a step in the right direction. That is who we are and on behalf of my Advisory Board members, I thank you for your continued support of Keep Eunice Beautiful.
Donna Baltakis, Director
Keep Eunice Beautiful
The report also included the following.
Volunteers: 173
Volunteer Hours: 7,740
Volunteer Workforce Value: $170,227
Participants: 1,155
Students Reached: 1,250
Total Litter Reduction Events: 25
Recyclables Collected: 4,195 lbs.
Litter Removed: 27,900 lbs.
Cigarette Butts Removed: 8,500
Leaders Against Litter Event
Great American Cleanup Event
America Recycles Event
Engagement:
School Groups 7
University Groups 1
Businesses 26
Churches 7
Professional Assoc. 5
Youth Groups 3
Other 2
Cleanups
Land-based Cleanups 25
Land-based Litter Removed 27,900 lbs.
Land-based Cigarette Butts 8,500
Plantings
Trees 8
Gardens Planted and/or maintained 24
Gardening Workshops 1
Participants 59
Education/training
KLB State Conference
KLB Regional Meeting
KLB Quarterly Webinars
KAB Bi-monthly Webinars
Grants awarded
*Trash Receptacle Grant – 4 receptacles
*Clean-up Supplies/Affiliate Grant -
Grabbers, safety vests, gloves, T-shirts, bags
Waste reduction and recycling
School Recycling:
Programs 7
Students Reached 1,250
Recyclables Collected 3,450 lbs.
America Recycles Day (ARD):
ARD Events 1
Participants 30
Recyclables Collected 745 lbs.
Household Hazardous Waste Days (HHW):
HHW Events 1
Households 41
Batteries 430
Bulbs 425
Pesticides 2,840 lbs.
Oil 250 gallons
Paint 600 lbs.