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Special to the Daily News

Bell County’s local PRIDE Coordinators are looking for volunteers to be PRIDE champions and knock out litter during PRIDE Spring Cleanup Month in April.

“If you want your community to look its best, and if you like to spend time outside with friends and family, then answer the call for volunteers when your PRIDE Coordinators announce Spring Cleanup events,” said Tammie Wilson of PRIDE, the nonprofit organization that sponsors the Spring Cleanup across 42 counties of southern and eastern Kentucky.

“When you volunteer, you become part of a winning tradition that has rallied 387,000 volunteers to pick up 755,000 bags of trash since PRIDE began in 1997,” Wilson added. “That’s why the theme on the free volunteer T-shirts this year is, ‘Be a PRIDE Champion: Knock Out Litter.’”

In Bell County, John O’Boyle is the PRIDE Coordinator. Randy Melton is the PRIDE Coordinator for Middlesboro, and Ina Robbins is the Pineville PRIDE Coordinator.

“I enjoy serving as a PRIDE Coordinator because I get to meet wonderful people and see positive results by the minute as litter-strewn areas are transformed,” said Melton, who is also Middlesboro’s Code Enforcement Officer and Stormwater Program Manager.

“Volunteering during Spring Cleanup Month is important because we need to instill in our children and neighbors personal pride in our land and our environment,” Melton continued. “We could be more successful if our businesses, schools, church, clubs and other groups all had a presence during April and throughout the year.”

“I want to thank John, Randy and Ina for serving as PRIDE Coordinators,” Wilson said.

PRIDE Coordinators are volunteers who are appointed by mayors and judge-executives. They work with the PRIDE staff to organize cleanup activities, recruit volunteers and track cleanup results.

PRIDE Coordinators now are planning each community’s Spring Cleanup activities. They will schedule cleanups and recruit volunteers to participate. They also will assist volunteers who want to plan their own cleanups. Some communities also will offer free trash disposal events or clean up illegal dumps during the Spring Cleanup.

PRIDE will provide volunteer T-shirts, cleanup supplies and funding assistance for local governments.

The 2013 PRIDE Spring Cleanup is made possible in part by a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the following sponsors: Waste Connections of Kentucky (Gold Sponsor), Outdoor Venture Corporation (Silver Sponsor), Walmart (Silver Sponsor), Hacker Brothers, Inc. (Bronze Sponsor), Lightyear Network Solutions (Bronze Sponsor) and Owens Auto & Truck Parts (Bronze Sponsor).

To volunteer for the Spring Cleanup, please call John O’Boyle at 337-3076. Middlesboro residents, please contact Randy Melton at 499-3677 or middlesborocodes@yahoo.com. In Pineville, please contact Ina Robbins at 337-2958 or ctyclerk@bellsouth.net.

A calendar of Spring Cleanup events will be updated regularly at http://kypride.org/calendar.