Keep Levelland Beautiful received the 2023 Gold Star Affiliate award for the Keep Texas Beautiful organization.
Chamber of Commerce special projects manager Kelly Hancock explained the Keep Levelland Beautiful organization has been awarded the Gold Star Affiliate award four years in a row.
“We’ve been Gold Star four years in a row and the year before we were silver,” Hancock said. “It’s fulfilling different requirements, so to do that we have to participate in a cleanup. We have different projects; we have webinars or trainings that we have to go to. I had to complete 10 trainings and that could be through Keep Texas Beautiful or different entities in Texas.”
The Gold Star Affiliate award will allow the organization to apply for grants for projects.
“It will help us with in future grants and awards,” Hancock said. “If you are not at least in good standing, you can’t even apply for grants and awards. So, us being a Gold Star that does help. So, my next task is to look for more of that money that doesn’t have to come from the taxpayers.”
A recent large project for the Keep Levelland Beautiful organization was painting the metal bungalows on the railroad tracks.
“We’ve had numerous big projects,” Hancock said. “You’ll notice the bungalows, the big silver box is on the railroad, those were completed in 2020. So, that was a huge beautification project.”
The organization recently partnered with the Noon Rotary Club to plant 11 trees at Kauffman Park to celebrate Earth Day.
“We’re really fortunate to partner with the Noon Rotary Club and plant 11 trees,” Hancock said. “That was a huge accomplishment because that’s not only saving the taxpayers money, but it’s also saving our program and the city money too because they applied for that grant.”
The recent electronic recycling event was funded the H-E-B green bag grant and the Hockley County Endowment Award.
“We were fortunate enough in 2022 to apply for the H-E-B green bag grant award and the Hockley County Endowment Award and those two grants actually funded the electronic recycling event that happened on April 1st,” Hancock said.
Keep Levelland Beautiful’s next event will be the fall community wide cleanup on October 7.
“In terms of our activities coming up, October 7th will be our next our fall sweep working another community wide cleanup,” Hancock said.
The organization has been awarded $4,000 in grants this past year and Hancock is looking to share the success with everyone.
“We’ve got over $4,000 in grants just this past year,” Hancock said. “We’ve won Gold Star for four years, a GCA award that we’re very blessed and very humble that we are able to receive these rewards. We want to share that success with everybody, whether you’re young, old, been here forever, brand new, we love new ideas.”