New Mexico Tourism awards Clean and Beautiful grants to 3 San Juan County entities

Mike Easterling, Farmington Daily Times
·3 min read

The New Mexico Tourism Department has awarded more than $900,000 to 59 entities across the state to fight litter as part of its Clean and Beautiful Grant Program for Fiscal Year 2024, including three entities in San Juan County.

Leading the local recipients was the City of Bloomfield, which will receive $16,100.13. The City of Farmington will receive $10,331, and San Juan County will receive $7,800.

Melinda Gomez, director of Bloomfield’s Parks & Recreation director, said the grant would be used in several ways. Her department will place additional Dumpsters near its offices to provide residents with an alternative to illegal dumping, she said, while other monies will be used to purchase safety vests and trash bags for citizens participating in trash pick-up days along U.S. Highway 550.

The city also will hold an additional free dumping day on a vacant corner at the intersection of U.S. Highway 550 and U.S. Highway 64 in October during which residents will be able to dispose of household trash, she said.

But the majority of funds will be spent on two other projects, one of which is a graffiti abatement project under the U.S. Highway 550 bridge crossing the San Juan River, Gomez said. The other is a program that will allow her to hire five paid interns from Charlie Y. Brown High School, the Bloomfield School District’s nontraditional high school, to paint murals on the bridge’s concrete support structures.

Charlie Y. Brown students are required to complete a community service project in order to graduate, and this project would help them meet that requirement, in addition to providing them with some cash and allowing them to indulge their artistic impulses, Gomez said.

“That’s a great project for us,” she said.

Gomez said she already has been in contact with the school’s principal, John Sandoval, about the project, and he is enthusiastic about it. She said it would take a couple of months to organize the project and select five artistic students, and she expects work to get underway in the spring of 2024.

Volunteers load a truck with trash after holding a cleanup day at Lake Farmington. The city has received a state grant to fund other cleanup events at sites around the city in Fiscal Year 2024.
Volunteers load a truck with trash after holding a cleanup day at Lake Farmington. The city has received a state grant to fund other cleanup events at sites around the city in Fiscal Year 2024.

The City of Farmington will split its grant among three projects, according to Assistant City Manager Shana Reeves and Natalie Spruell, interim director of Parks, Recreation and Cultural Affairs. Reeves said approximately $3,500 would be spent on an anti-littering campaign and an additional free Dumpster Day in the city while $4,300 would go toward the payment of dues and memberships in various state and national groups such as Keep America Beautiful.

The remainder of the money will be used to cover the costs associated with community cleanup days at such sites as along the Animas River, and at Lake Farmington and the Glade Run Recreation Area, Spruel said. The grant will not cover the full costs of those cleanup efforts, she said, but it will help the city provide volunteers with trash bags and other materials needed as part of the effort.

County spokesman Devin Neeley said the county’s grant will be used to hold two more free dumping events in addition to the events already planned. Neeley said a free household hazardous waste Dumpster day will be held on Oct. 14, while free dumping at county transfer stations will be offered Oct. 21 and Oct. 22. The events will be open to folks who live in unincorporated parts of San Juan County.

Volunteers pose for a photo after taking part in a cleanup day at the Calle Norte Bike Park Trailhead, one of several annual cleanup events on public lands held throughout the city.
Volunteers pose for a photo after taking part in a cleanup day at the Calle Norte Bike Park Trailhead, one of several annual cleanup events on public lands held throughout the city.

The county also has received a $15,000 grant from the New Mexico Environment Department’s Recycling and Illegal Dumping Act program, Neeley said. That money will be used to fund the creation and free distribution of a coloring and activity book for students in kindergarten through third grade that discourages littering, he said.

Neeley said he anticipated it would be early next year before the books are created and distributed.

Mike Easterling can be reached at 505-564-4610 or measterling@daily-times.com. Support local journalism with a digital subscription: http://bit.ly/2I6TU0e.

This article originally appeared on Farmington Daily Times: Bloomfield, Farmington, San Juan County receive anti-litter grants