Student Launches County Line Cleanup

MADISON – A local student aimed to beautify trash strewn stretches of County Line Road with a

neighborhood clean-up effort this weekend and sought volunteers to help out.

“I needed to get involved,” said Tyler Clemons, an information systems and marketing major at the University of Alabama Huntsville and frequent runner along County Line.

Clemons explained that, on his running route near Mill Road and James Clemens High School, he frequently came across bottles, cardboardand scraps of paper, more trash than he could pick up and carry by himself as he jogged.

“I saw a box, beer cans, some wrappers from Taco Bell or McDonalds just tossed into the middle of the road,” he said. “After that I was disgusted and decided something needed to be done.”

Via email and a Facebook page newly created for the campaign, Clemons invited the community out for his “Operation Clean Up County Line Road.” Scheduled for the morning of Saturday, July 12, the event will involve four groups of volunteers walking County Line Road, starting at Highway 72 to the north and Madison Boulevard to the south, then meeting in the middle near Arbor Trace, Clemons said.

“It’s not my town. It’s our town. God gave us this awesome city,” said Clemons in a YouTube Video

created to call attention to the problem. In the video, Clemons travels along a stretch of the road,

points out and collects refuse he spots in the course of abrief walk.

“I didn’t really think about it and then it was ‘whoa! I didn’t’ notice all this trash along the side of the road,’” said Jacob Clemmons (no relation) a friend and jogging partner. “Now I notice it.”

Clemmons declared himself persuaded and said he would join the effort. Cleanup volunteers will rendezvous at The Grove Baptist Church on County Line road at 9:00 am Saturday, then take to the sidewalks and shoulder along the road, said Clemons.

Charles Molineaux is an anchor and investigative reporter with WAFF 48 News