Great American Cleanup in Oconee Events

The Keep Oconee County Beautiful Commission (KOCBC) would like to invite all Oconee County businesses, community groups, civic leaders and citizens to join the “GREAT AMERICAN CLEANUP in OCONEE.”  Keep America Beautiful’s Great American Cleanup is the nation's largest community improvement program, involving an estimated 3 million volunteers and attendees annually.

KOCBC participates each year by holding a huge cleanup event.  This year we will have two events – one to educate the public on the benefits of recycling versus the costs of littering and one to put Oconee citizens in action picking up litter and making Oconee County as litter free as possible.

Thursday, April 4^th – KOCBC Workshop:  Recycling Pays, Litter Costs! 

The one hour evening workshop, starting at 7 pm in the Oconee County Library’s Auditorium, will feature Athens-Clarke County’s Waste Reduction Administrator Suki Janssen.  If you’ve ever looked at an item and wondered whether to toss it in the recycling bin or the trash can, this is the workshop for you.  During the first half of the workshop, Suki will teach Oconee citizens about why recycling pays, how to recycle and what should be recycled. 

During the second half of the workshop, KOCBC members will educate the public on the high cost of littering to everyone.  Litter costs us in so many ways and we want to educate Oconee citizens on how all of us, working together, can help reduce the cost of littering in our beautiful county. 

Saturday, April 20^th – Great American Cleanup in Oconee – Kickoff and Litter Pick-up

KOCBC urges Oconee citizens to join in this mighty effort to eliminate all the litter in Oconee County.  We will meet at 9 am in the parking lot of the Oconee County Library for a short kickoff celebration followed by litter pick-up assignments – including a cleanup along the banks of the Apalachee River.  Making Oconee a litter-free county is a big job but, once done, we hope that our citizens will be so proud of how Oconee looks that they will want to keep it that way! 

New this year, there will be prizes awarded to the groups that pick up the most litter and recover the most recyclables including a $500 prize donated by a local green business, Greensource=mc² and a $100 prize donated by another local business, Consider It Done.

In addition, we encourage Oconee citizens to hold their own Great American Cleanup projects (litter pick-ups, planting, recycling, etc.) anytime between now and the end of May. 

For more information, to sign up for a cleanup project or to report your cleanup efforts, please contact KOCBC Executive Director Angela Helwig at 706-769-5120 or e-mail to ahelwig@oconee.ga.us.