On a recent work day at Crownover Middle School, the student government kids asked me to help them out with a recycling project. It seems the Denton ISD Middle Schools are having a recycling contest. Crownover is not in first place and needs our help getting there! The contest ends soon, so heave-ho the recyclable paper, etc., to the blue recycling dumpster behind Crownover Middle School on Creekside Drive!
Because our curbside recycling program is so successful here in Corinth, it seems we don't have much leftover stuff for the Crownover kids. Maybe we should declare a recycling holiday from Waste Management and get all our goodies over to Crownover so they can show the other DISD schools just how environmentally-minded the families in Corinth are and just how much they pull together to help one of their own!
KCB would like to thank everyone who lends a hand to Crownover in advance!
The competition is sponsored each year by the Texas Department of Transportation and is open to all Keep Texas Beautiful affiliates in Texas. The grading is based on several criteria and the organizations are grouped by population, in order to provide a more fair and equal basis to judge the individual entries.
Corinth competed in the category five population group (15,000-25,000). This group is very competitive and has several past winners who have also won in national competition with Keep America Beautiful.
Keep Corinth Beautiful would like to thank all the volunteers who come out to help us make our community a better place to live and work. Without your help, we would have never achieved the level of program excellence the third place trophy represents!
Let's all keep up the great work and strive to make Corinth the first place winner for 2009!!!!!
The O.P. Schnabel Senior Citizen Award is one of nine categories in the Keep Texas Beautiful Awards and recognizes individuals who have exhibited long-term dedication to the principles of KTB.
Each year, Keep Texas Beautiful acknowledges deserving senior citizens, community groups, individuals, civic organizations, media, government entities and law enforcement officials for their commitment to litter prevention and cleanup, illegal dumping enforcement, education and publicity of environmental issues and community beautification.
Award winners were recognized during the 42nd Annual Keep Texas Beautiful Conference, June 8-11, 2009, in Houston. A full list of winners and award descriptions can be found at ktb.org.
Keep Texas Beautiful, a statewide grassroots environmental and community improvement nonprofit, strives to educate and engage Texans to take responsibility for improving their community environment. KTB and its more than 360 affiliates work with government, businesses, civic groups, and volunteers to ensure that every Texan has the opportunity to make Texas the cleanest, most beautiful state in the nation. For more information on programs and events, call 1-800-CLEAN-TX or visit www.ktb.org.
To all those who participated in our annual Texas Trash Off event April 4, Keep Corinth Beautiful wants to say thanks for all you brought us!!!!! This year we teamed up again with the City of Corinth Streets and Drainage Department for our second annual Household Hazardous Waste Collection event. It was an incredibly successful event again this year! Thanks to all who brought us their chemicals, paint, and other recyclables. Just look at what was collected:
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TYPE OF WASTE Latex Paint Oil Based Paint Flammable Liquids Flammable Loose Packs Acids Bases Pesticide/Herbicides Oxidizer Light Bulbs Oil Filters Aerosol Cans Household Batteries Car Batteries Oil Antifreeze Recycled waste |
WASTE IN POUNDS 10,200 200 400 100 200 100 500 0 75 30 400 150 100 2,500 400 3,600 pounds |
206 households participated this year!!!
Our friend Computer Crusher also stopped by and collected:
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Total PC's Recycled Total Monitors Recycled Total Computer Peripherals Recycled Total Printers Recycled Total Misc Computer Parts Total Hard Drives Destroyed Grand Total E-Waste Removal |
1754 lbs 1493 lbs 225 lbs 297 lbs 180 lbs 31 3,980 lbs |
All of this was diverted from our landfill and reprocessed in the USA!
Keep Corinth Beautiful contributed 4 full roll off dumpsters full of residential waste which is over 40,000 lbs of trash. Our volunteers went out and collected over 400 lbs of litter as well!
Keep Up The Great Work!
Thank you from Keep Corinth Beautiful!
Check out our 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 Corinth 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.