Lincoln County is feeling a little cleaner these days.

     The last day of the Great American Cleanup was May 6 in the Loyd Star community.

     Overall, collection was down compared to last year, according to Lincoln County Litter Control Coordinator Ronnie Durr.

     The five collection points throughout the county racked up 226 tons of debris. Last year’s collections totaled 279 tons.

     “Our total was down quite a bit, and so was our collection of tires,” Durr said. “Last year we collected 6,276 tires. This year we had 4,793 tires.”

     District Three collected the most debris with 59 tons.

     Keep Lincoln County Beautiful committee member Homer Richardson said the results from this year’s cleanup were good news.

     “It’s encouraging because we’ve been doing this for about 10 years,” Richardson said. “It’s amazing how much stuff we get out at the cleanup sites. We are seeing a bit of a trend that people are catching up on stuff they have put away and are getting rid of, which is good.”

     Durr said as usual, there were some abnormal items tossed in the trash receptacles.

     “We had a few boats this year, that’s unusual,” he said. “For some reason there were a lot of toilets as well. At each site there was an abundance of them. I don’t know if people are remodeling or what, but they were there.”

     Common items were paint and old TVs, according to Durr.

     “Three of the sites had a lot of paint,” he said. “But that’s every year. There were many older TVs, the old cabinet mounted models.”

     The overall goal of the cleanup is to allow people an opportunity to dispose of things they don’t want and to try to prevent litter.

     “We hope collections have gone down because people have thrown out things they were holding on to,” said Durr. “We hope we’re getting on top of it and people have less and less. You’ll never get it all, but hopefully you can get to a point where the numbers decrease to a very low level.”

     Durr said he’s had no negative comments about the cleanup and said most people are appreciative for the opportunity to conveniently dispose of unwanted items.

     “Someone expressed their interest in having event twice a year, in the spring and fall, but due to monetary restrictions we cannot do that,” said Durr.

     Durr said his office made it a point to clean up everything at the dump sites.

     “Three supervisors have told me that their sites were all clean,” Durr said. “We’ve always had people in the past who would drop things off after the end date, but this year that has not occurred.”

     The event could not have occurred had it not been for help from some key people.

     “I’d like to thank the property owners for using their property for the cleanup,” Durr said. “Without these people, we would not have a cleanup. I’d also like to than the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department for their patrols to keep everyone safe and the Lincoln County Board of Supervisors for working with us.”

     Richardson said it’s about keeping the area’s beauty.

     “We’re trying to keep the county and state beautiful,” Richardson said. “Most states and counties have committees working on beautification and litter control. Most people do care about keeping Mississippi beautiful, but sometimes we run across people who don’t.”

     This year’s cleanup went off smoothly, according to Durr.

     “This year was a tremendous success as far as I’m concerned,” Durr said. “We look forward to doing it again next year around the same time and hopefully our collection numbers go down.”