A cleaner Lawrence County: Group starts cleanup project

The Lawrence County Grassroots Property Cleanup Project was recently formed with a goal to motivate residents to clean up their properties. With more volunteers, the group would eventually like to assist homeowners with cleanup.

“It’s basically about cleaning the county properties, from trash on the road to all the abandoned and uninhabited properties,” said Larry Will, committee president. “There’s just a lot of issues out there with poor homes and abandoned homes. Right now, we’re trying to get the interest level up for this. We’re just getting started.”

Currently, the group’s committee consists of Will, Spice Valley Township Trustee Sarah Hillenburg and Shawswick Township Trustee Millard Jones.

Will pointed to multiple reasons for wanting to have more pleasant properties in the county.

“There’s up to a 1,000 abandoned (properties) out there,” Will said. “I think all of this stuff out there impedes our economic development. So I think anybody that might want to live or a bring a business here, sooner or later they are going to get off the beaten track and see, overall, it’s not the cleanest county in the world. We need all the help we can get to bring business and people here.”

Children also need to be thought of, Hillenburg said. Surrounding environments can impact their physical and mental well-being.

“Nobody wants a dangerous house that might fall down if kids are playing in it,” Hillenburg said. “...I don’t want kids to live in filth and dangerous places. ...It’s important to kids’ mental health to live in a clean, healthy environment. They are at the mercy of (the parents).”

The accumulation of trash and unwanted materials can be attributed to many things, Hillenburg said, from not caring to not just not having any help. She would like to see the Lawrence County Transfer Station expand evening hours.

“People drive by and see places, and think people are lazy. In Williams, I don’t think the people are lazy,” Hillenburg said. “Some just don’t have the ability to get it there. Some things may just be too big, or some people may not have the right vehicle to haul something.

“And the landfill (which is now the transfer station) is only open until 4 p.m. I know my husband doesn’t get home until 6. Because it has such inconvenient hours, it makes people less likely want to go...get things to the dump.”

“And we need to have a way for the county to come help pick up large stuff that people can’t get there otherwise. And if you have trash in your yard, you can go out and pick it up. That’s something you can do on a personal level.”

In future, Will said the group would like to participate in the Indiana Land Bank program, as well as state and federal blight-elimination programs. In addition, he thinks ordinances need to be established to hold residents accountable.

“Daviess County has a good program...they even have things they have on people’s door knobs sort of saying ‘we have our eye on you, and you need to clean up,”’ Will said. “They have a lot of ordinances in place, so they have that authority. We’re not pushing that too much at this point, but eventually I would like to see an ordinance where we can basically allow the county to be able to put people on notice.”

Will said he would like to find volunteers for help with cleaning, including “a strong representative from each township.” For those interested in volunteering, email Will at larrconn@comcast.net.

Hillenburg encourages local residents to help out their neighbors when they can.

“Our focus is working on moving our focus to have a healthy and clean environment, and be proud of where we live,” Hillenburg said.