GREENVILLE — Darke County Solid Waste Management District has been presented a 2019 Cigarette Litter Prevention Program Grant to Keep Darke County Beautiful.
This national non-profit provides grant funding, resources to Help Darke County Battle Blight of Cigarette Litter. Fifty organizations received this Keep America Beautiful Cigarette Litter Prevention Program (CLPP) merit-based grant.
Keep Darke County Beautiful’s grant award of $2,500 will be used to Keep Darke County Beautiful to help combat the most commonly littered item in America.
“Keep Darke County Beautiful with grant funding from Keep America Beautiful is pleased to provide pocket ashtrays to fair-goers at The Great Darke County Fair,” said Duane Edwards, president of the organization.
Edwards also noted that there will be ash receptacles at most fair building entrances. Pocket ashtrays will be distributed fair week with the cooperation of Wayne HealthCare at its air-conditioned tent.
“I’ve been working with Jason Francis, the wellness coordinator through Wayne HealthCare’s wellness program,” said Krista Fourman, director of Darke County Solid Waste Management District.
Communities implementing the CLPP in 2018 reported an average 62 percent reduction of cigarette litter, even greater than the previous year’s average reduction of 52 percent.
It was noted that Cigarette Litter Prevention Program grant funding empowers communities to help mitigate the economic, environmental and quality of-life impact of cigarette butt littering.
“Litter is both the smallest and largest problem at the same time,” said Jerred Jones, program director for the CLPP. “Keep America Beautiful is dedicated to educating consumers on the hazards of littering in public spaces and providing the tools to reduce litter. Access to ash receptacles and portable pocket ashtrays are crucial to changing littering behaviors.”
The CLPP, created by Keep America Beautiful in 2002, is the nation’s largest program aimed at eliminating cigarette butt and cigar tip litter. Since its inception, according to reports from Fourman, the program has been successfully implemented in more than 1,800 urban, suburban and rural communities nationwide. Over the past decade, participating communities have consistently cut cigarette butt litter by 50 percent based on local measurements taken in the first four months to six months after program implementation.
Research has shown that even self-reported “non-litterers” often don’t consider tossing cigarette butts on the ground to be “littering.” Keep America Beautiful has found that cigarette butt litter occurs most often at transition point — areas where a person must stop smoking before proceeding into another area. These include bus stops, entrances to stores and public buildings, and the sidewalk areas outside of bars and restaurants, among others.
The CLPP is supported by funding from Altria, Reynolds American, and the Santa Fe Natural Tobacco Company.
