Register now for Great American Cleanup

to be eligible for $4K neighborhood grant

COVINGTON, Ky. – If you’re the outdoorsy, “like-to-keep-my-community-looking good” type, then you’re just the person to help lead a neighborhood or site cleanup in The Cov for next Saturday’s Great American Cleanup event.

Each year, Keep Covington Beautiful and The Center for Great Neighborhoods partner with the City of Covington’s Solid Waste & Recycling Division to organize the local version of the Great American Cleanup, inspiring hundreds of volunteers to donate a little sweat and a lot of energy to spruce up green spaces throughout Covington.

Depending upon the location – which can be a median, street corner, park or wooded area – the job might include picking up trash and yard debris, spreading mulch, pruning bushes, repairing neighborhood signs, and planting seasonal flowers.

But with this year’s event only a week away – from 9 a.m. to noon, Saturday, Oct. 22 – more participation is needed.

“We have only three sites signed up so far, so we’re looking for folks to lead sites, not just join in,” said Shannon Ratterman, interim director for The Center for Great Neighborhoods.

Currently, cleanup sites are located:

• In the Eastside neighborhood, with volunteers meeting at Randolph Park.
• In the Westside neighborhood, on Monroe Street.
• And at an adopted site of the Urban Forestry Fall Tree Planting in Austinburg.

$4,000 on the table

In addition to keeping The Cov looking great, another big incentive to registering your site or neighborhood is a cash prize. Whichever neighborhood picks up the most trash will be the recipient of KCB’s Perk Up the Neighborhood event.

“We’re using the community trash/impact totals to help us determine a winner of the Perk Up the Neighborhood,” said Jen Barnett, KCB board president. “The winning neighborhood wins a grant of up to $4,000 for use in their neighborhood for a cool project. So, this is a great time to register your site or neighborhood and throw your hat in the ring. It’s a great way to give back to the community and catch a few last fall sunbeams.”

Here's the Covington Great American Cleanup webpage.

Here's where you can register a site or neighborhood. Once you register your site, you can also apply for a $250 grant to help buy materials and/or tools for the day.

Volunteers or volunteer groups can register here to be assigned to one of the cleanup sites. 

Thanks to the City’s Solid Waste & Recycling Division and Rumpke Waste and Recycling, KCB will provide trash bags, gloves, grabbers, trash bag removal, tools, hand sanitizer and disinfectants, snacks, and a giveaway for every volunteer.

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