Diamondhead comes together to clean roadways
Members of the Diamondhead community held a cleanup day Oct. 2 in partnership with #keepARbeautiful.
Cindy Sacker, a member of the Diamondhead community, said she noticed there was a lot of trash on the path she walks three to four times a week so she decided to do something about it.
“I just kept noticing trash every day; even though I would pick up trash, it would keep coming back. When I would look down other streets or drive down other streets in the neighborhood, the same thing, there’s trash everywhere,” she said.
“So I thought we probably needed to get together as a community and try to see if we could clean it up and just create awareness so that more people would be mindful of the trash and think more about before they threw something out or before something blew out of their car and if it was in their yard or in front of their yard, to go ahead and pick it up, even though they didn’t throw it down,” she said.
While Sacker organized the event, she took no credit for the work because it was not a solitary effort, she said.
“I had support from our homeowners’ association and the volunteers,” Sacker said. “I just organized. I did the paperwork, but everybody else pitched in, too.”
A few months ago, Sacker was told about the Keep Arkansas Beautiful program and discovered it was accepting applications for its annual fall cleanup event, which they hold the first weekend after Labor Day, through the end of October.
“You can send an application, and they will send you supplies, and so I sent the application, I think back in April or May, and we got it organized,” Sacker said, noting she and her friend Virginia Paxton posted it and got it done.
“They sent supplies, we asked for help, and our community came out and supported just like a great community does,” Sacker said.
“We also sent out a constant contact to let the residents know what we’re doing so they can participate. We offered vouchers for a meal,” Paxton said. “We wanted residents to visit that and get familiar with their foods, and that worked out well. So we handed those vouchers out to the participants.”
Sacker said 20 volunteers were helping on a rainy Saturday, noting, “I was blown away by the volunteers and the support that we had because we wouldn’t have had nearly the success and the results that we got if we hadn’t.”
“Most of them were our golfers who are really active in the community, and we all had golf carts. So, we just went on either side of the street; covered a lot of territory in a short time,” Paxton said.
Diamondhead is 2,300 acres, and Sacker noted they didn’t cover all the roads, but with all the volunteers, they fanned out and chose some streets to cover.
“Some streets are larger than the others. So one would take one end, and one would take the other, and we fanned out, and then we have common areas, too. We have a swimming pool, park, we’ve got the clubhouse, and just a whole kiddie area, too, and we picked up trash in all those areas,” Sacker said. “So common areas, along with just stuff on the roadsides.”
Sacker said it was “super-easy” to get involved, noting, “If I can figure it out, pretty much anybody could.”
She said all that’s required is you go to the website, keepARbeautiful.com, and there’s tons of resources on that site.
“There’s an application form. There are templates to create your own fliers, there’s just a wealth of information there, but anybody can do it. I’ve noticed that a lot of cities across the state are doing it. It’s an annual event for some of these places. I feel like Diamondhead needed to be a part of that too, and probably Hot Springs should, too, if it’s not already,” she said.
“All I can say is just to express my heartfelt gratitude for all the volunteers who came out and supported us and helped us out through the ugly day that we had and to encourage and remind everyone to please be mindful of the trash. We live in one of the prettiest states in the country. The trash on our roadsides is just a shame, and I wish more people would be aware and pick it up,” Sacker said.