Keep Fitchburg Beautiful wins Rookie honor

FITCHBURG » Keep Fitchburg Beautiful received the Keep Massachusetts Beautiful Rookie Chapter of the Year Award at the 2020 Massachusetts Clean Community Awards held virtually on Dec. 3.

“We’re so proud and honored to receive this award and attribute our recognition here to the work of our many dedicated Fitchburg volunteers, and our health and public works departments that always support city cleanup efforts,” said Keep Fitchburg Beautiful Chair Sam Squailia.

Squailia attended the annual Massachusetts Municipal Association conference in Boston in January representing Fitchburg as a city councilor-at

large.

“I saw the Keep Massachusetts Beautiful booth at the trade show and knew immediately we needed to be a part of this organization,” she said.

Keep Fitchburg Beautiful, an official chapter of Keep Massachusetts Beautiful, was formed in February with the mission to bring residents, businesses, and government together with a common goal in mind — making

the city a cleaner, greener place to live, work and play.

“The overall goal of Keep Fitchburg Beautiful is to be a source of community and volunteer connection,” Squailia said. It is also intended to “connect Keep America Beautiful and Keep Massachusetts Beautiful with the city of Fitchburg and with the businesses to the volunteers to provide cleanup and beautification opportunities in the city including organized events, supplies needed for cleanups and beautification projects, grant opportunities and more.”

Squailia said she has been or

ganizing groups to do citywide cleanups each spring for years.

“It’s a small act to clean up an area of litter but can make a big impact both visually and in terms of getting motivated to volunteer and help clean up our community,” she said.

From March through May, a number of Keep Fitchburg Beautiful volunteers individually cleaned up dozens of parks and streets around Fitchburg.

“We have cleaned up over 49 streets and parks this year alone, even with the COVID restrictions barring us from organized group cleanups,” Squailia said.

“This year we used our Facebook group to list areas to be cleaned and allow residents to report with pictures what they cleaned.”

They plan to continue doing small group and individual cleanups in the spring.

“We are hoping in 2021 we can get a little more organization and a little funding to provide grabbers, bags and gloves to volunteers,” Squailia said.

Keep Fitchburg Beautiful is collaborating with the North County Land Trust, the Busy Bees Preschool, and Growing Places, a nonprofit that specializes in community gardening, to establish community gardens on a recently acquired parcel on Quarry Lane in Fitchburg.

The group was awarded a $500 Plant Something Bee-eautiful grant in October from Keep Massachusetts Beautiful to help pay for additional pollinatorfriendly plants for the gardens. The community garden is in a densely populated, ethnically diverse neighborhood that has been designated by the state as an Environmental Justice area.

For more information visit keepfitchburgbeautiful.com and follow Keep Fitchburg Beautiful on Facebook and Instagram.

COURTESY SAM SQUAILIA Keep Fitchburg Beautiful Chair Sam Squailia, left, takes a photo after a clean-up last spring. She is joined by Joe Bowen (yellow slicker), Josiah Richards (black slicker) and Melissa Neufell (green slicker) during cleanup of Canton Street.

COURTESY SAM SQUAILIA Benjamin Peterson (in the foreground) and Aerevyn Harteis are shown during a cleanup of Canton Street earlier this year.

COURTESY SAM SQUAILIA Keep Fitchburg Beautiful Chair Sam Squailia, left, takes a photo of a group of volunteers after a day to picking up trash in Fitchburg earlier this year.