The numbers are in, and thanks to all the citizens of Corinth, our annual Great American Clean Up events were a tremendous success! Read further and find out just how much work your friends and neighbors did this spring:
The bed was installed by Keep Corinth Beautiful to showcase these wonderful options. While the perennials planted out there are fairly common in other areas of North Texas, the real star is the Turffalo grass. The grass was developed by the Texas Tech University Agricultural program as an alternative to some of the more water hogging grasses we see all over North Texas (like St. Augustine).
Would you enjoy having to mow your yard only twice during the lawn season? How about watering it only during extreme drought? Turfallo gives you those options and looks great! Stop by and see the other treasures in the garden and, while you are there, take your shoes off and stroll in the Turffalo.
The April 19th Texas Trash Off event was one crazy day! We started early with the trash-off signature litter pick up. This year, 40+ volunteers went out and picked up over 500 pounds of trash from our local roadways! Way to go! Without you, the City would have to dedicate two people for one week to pick up the same amount of litter.
The next part of the event involved Keep Corinth Beautiful, the City of Corinth, The Upper Trinity Regional Water District, and Computer Crusher. Through the Household Hazardous Waste program, an amazing amount of hazardous waste and recyclables were collected!
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TYPE OF WASTE Latex Paint Oil Based Paint Flammable Liquids Flammable Loose Packs Acids Bases Pesticide Solid Pesticide Liquid Oxidizer Light Bulbs Oil Filters Aerosol Cans Household Batteries Car Batteries Oil Antifreeze Recycled waste |
WASTE IN POUNDS 18,000 500 1,100 1,500 250 200 900 600 400 96 35 550 400 1,260 2,000 700 4,100 pounds |
HOW ABOUT THOSE NUMBERS!!!!!!!
Keep Corinth Beautiful also provided dumpsters for all those other things that just will not go away. We collected over 1200 pounds of recyclables and returned $150.00 back to the City General Fund. The dumpsters recovered over 6000 pounds of waste!
The final event of the Great American Cleanup involved the National Junior Honor Society at Crownover Middle School. Last fall the sponsor, Holly Ward-Jensen came to Keep Corinth Beautiful with a request for help. She wanted the group to take responsibility for a part of their world. With help from KCB, the group adopted the corner of Creekside and Post Oak Road.
During May the group completed plans for a "contemplation" garden on the corner. The construction project took about two hours and upon completion a garden, complete with a bench was installed. The kids did the work and have a plan in place to care for the garden over the summer. They planted Texas Friendly selections which are water conservation minded and will look great in the future. Watch the corner. Every year the group will add to and update the garden! KCB worked with the NJHS, provided the plants and completed all the necessary bureaucratic steps to make the garden a reality. A special thanks goes out to KCB sponsors Wal-Mart and Hartwell's Nursery for all they did to help the effort.
None of this would have been possible without help from our sponsors. Keep Corinth Beautiful would like to thank the City of Corinth, Waste Management, Starbuck's, Albertsons, Wal-Mart, and new sponsor Hartwell's Nursery for all the help! Without great sponsors, Keep Corinth Beautiful would not be able to complete the mission of empowering the citizens to take control of their environment.
Check out our new series on Water Conservation!
I imagine several of you have an old computer lurking around the house somewhere. Mine stares at me from the closet floor every morning! What can you do with that beast? Read on:
With the new Windows Vista operating system or maybe the temptation to switch to an Apple system ever-present in our lives, most of us just buy new equipment for a turnkey-type deal. Where do we dispose of the old machine? Several companies out there will help you with the issue. Most of the programs have a fee attached, but it is a small price to pay to keep the old stuff from cluttering up our land fills.
Dell will pick up old Dell equpment from you, home or office. If you replace your old system with a Dell system, they will even come get the old one, regardless of who made it. Dell has details of their program at www.dell.com/recycling.
Hewlett-Packard will pick up old systems for a fee. Information concerning their services can be found at www.hp.com/recycle.
Lenovo and Apple also maintain fee-based recycling programs. They require the purchase of shipping labels to send equipment in for recycling. You can review the details of their programs at www.Lenovo.com and www.apple.com/environment/recycling/program.
Those are suggestions on how to get rid of the equipment. The data in the machines needs to be removed before any recycling occurs. Several software companies offer various programs for data removal. A search of the web will provide information on these useful tools.
Locally, Computer Crusher will do the task for you for a mere $15.00. This service is provided by Brad Chisum on Saturdays at various locations in the Denton area. The Computer Crusher website has a calendar of locations where he will be to collect the systems.
He will not only destroy the data, but also recycle your CPU, monitor, keyboard, and mouse for the $15.00 as well. He will also provide recycling services for other computer peripherals at the price of 38 cents per pound. Contact Brad for details at computercrusher@charter.net or call (940) 391-1136.
Also, several charities accept equipment for refurbishing. Contact the local branch of the charity before you go, in order to determine if they will accept your machines. Generally, the charities would like equipment less than three years old and in working order.
Take a look at OurEarth.org, an exciting new website that promotes environmental education and awareness, and operates a national environmental directory.
Car pooling is the best way to eliminate extra vehicle trips and pollution in North Texas. Sometimes neither DCTA nor DART is convenient for just where you need to go. Dallas Area Rapid Transit offers a van pooling program to all who are interested. This program is designed to group employees who work at the same business or nearby businesses and create a car pool just for those employees. It is a great way to save money and also help our environment. If you are interested in such a program, go to the Dallas Area Rapid Transit site for more information.
Also, the North Central Texas Council Of Governments is hosting a new feature on their web site. It is called the "TRY PARKING IT" survey program. Very few of us are aware of just how much we, as individuals, affect the air around us. This program is designed to help anyone see just how much their daily trips can make a difference to the air quality in North Texas. To access the program, go to tryparkingit.com and follow the instructions.
This program gives you a chance to see just how much your daily routine affects our air and also provides program ideas to eliminate trips and cut vehicle emissions. The site allows you to enter your data for daily trips and gives you a chance to use the tips provided to save fuel, money, and time. At the end of the month, you are provided with a report on just how much you did save. It is a neat way to see just how one individual can make a difference!
If you're doing spring cleaning and you have winter coats that you can donate to people who need them, please give them to the Lake Cities Spirit of Christmas lcspiritofchristmas.org for next year's give-away.
Donate by dropping off the coats at Comet Cleaners in Corinth or Daisy Cleaners in Hickory Creek or Lake Dallas.
Paints, pesticides, oils, cleaners, solvents, batteries, polishes... these are all examples of household materials that could be hazardous to the environment if used, stored, or disposed of improperly. If placed in the trash, these wastes may injure sanitation workers; if poured onto the ground or into waterways, they may contaminate drinking-water supplies.
Electronic wastes such as computer monitors, hard drives, televisions, cell phones and other electronic equipment are rapidly becoming a major part of the waste stream. These materials either need to be recycled or properly managed to reduce their impact on the environment.
Communities across Texas are addressing how to manage household hazardous waste. Each year, household hazardous wastes are properly disposed of at local collections held across the state.
The TCEQ's Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) Management program helps citizens and municipalities with educational and regulatory information on HHW programs, technical assistance setting up a HHW collection program, and general information on HHW issues.
Here are some tips to manage HHW, including ideas to avoid creating it in the first place.
- Reduce - Buy only the amount needed to do a job, that way you won't
have extra to get rid of. Also, use only the amount indicated on the label needed;
using more does not mean it will work that much better!
For example, you don't need a gallon of paint for a small chair. Here's a handy way to find out how much paint you need.
- Reuse - If you have a product that is still usable, but you don't need or want it, give it to a neighbor or relative who will use it (for its intended purpose) and will properly dispose of what is left over.
- Recycle - Take your nickel cadmium (ni-cad) batteries to a drop off center and return lead-acid batteries to the place of purchase; recycle your used oil and oil filters.
Learn More About Household Hazardous Waste
- Find local environmental information (by zip code) on HHW, recycling, and other topics at earth911.org.
- Get information about lead-based paint at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
- Learn about mercury thermometers at Health Care Without Harm.
- Learn about electronic waste management from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.
After they finished up, several of the classes made their own "Don't Mess With Texas" bumper stickers!
These kids want to show everyone they mean business when it comes to keeping our Texas highways clean and beautiful!
Thank you's go out to everyone in the Fourth Grade at Corinth Elementary and their Keep Texas Beautiful Educational Affiliate Director, Shirley Frase! Good Work!
We work to not only keep our City streets neat and litter free, but we also design, create, install, and manage beautification projects around Corinth. Our goal is to empower the citizens of Corinth so that we may all live, work and play in a cleaner, more scenic environment.
Keep Corinth Beautiful is entirely run by volunteers. We are always in need of people who don't mind getting dirty to make our city a better place to live.
Sound like fun? If you're up to the challenge, pull down the volunteer application, complete it and submit it to the city, or contact us directly. We hope to see you in one of our bright yellow Keep Corinth Beautiful t-shirts soon!
Questions? Either e-mail us at the link on the left or call Lowell Johnson (214) 728-7680.
Water conservation will always be an issue in Texas. Keep Corinth Beautiful is actively involved in water conservation and watershed protection for our water source, Lake Lewisville.
The City of Corinth receives its water from the Upper Trinity River Water Authority. It's very important that we protect our lake because our water source is a "closed loop" system.
If you aren't sure what you, as a citizen, can do to protect and conserve our water, please go to wateriq.org.
This site is administered by the Texas Water Development Board and has a wealth of information about conservation and protection of this valuable resource.