PICKENS COUNTY — Over 300 County employees, city and county officials and local residents took to the streets on Friday in a joint clean-up effort to reduce the amount of litter along Upstate roadways, parks and neighborhoods.
The idea for a county-wide clean up effort began after a Town Hall meeting with County Council Chairman Roy Costner but soon ballooned to include neighboring counties as well.
The plan circulated widely on social media websites with others chiming in asking how they could arrange something similar in their towns — the response was simple: Just grab a bag and go do it.
Over in Oconee County, volunteers from Duke Energy’s Oconee Nuclear Station teamed up with members of its Young Generation in Nuclear organization and its First Line Leaders Council.
They went to work to clean roadways near the station in support of Keep Oconee Beautiful Association’s (KOBA) “One Bag at a Time” initiative.
In total, volunteers picked up 30 bags of trash near highways 183 and 130.
Oconee Nuclear Station participates in the KOBA Adopt-A-Spot program twice each year.
Closer to home, the final numbers of exactly how much trash was collected aren’t in yet, but it’s hoped this won’t just be a one time thing.
“You don’t have to have a whole organized day to pick up litter,” said Mary Blythe of Easley who spent Friday morning picking up trash in front of her house on South 2nd Street in Easley. “If everyone just would make a concerted effort to pick up their yards and not throw stuff out the windows of their cars we’d be in a lot better shape. We can do this all the time.”