On August 3rd from 6am-10am, “Trees On The Coast” is planning a major clean-up at the corner of Beach Drive & Kelly Street in Destin.
Not only will it be a much needed improvement to that corner, but that corner is also home to Destin Elementary School.
Back in May, “Trees On The Coast” Director Bobby Wagner and his team made a day of planting trees and educating students at Destin Elementary about the importance of trees.
“Originally we did a clean-up with Principal Jannazo where we planted some trees with the students that included our educational aspect of Trees On The Coast,” explain Wagner. “That corner was supposed to be part of that project but had to be rescheduled.”
Wagner told Get The Coast that with teachers arriving back on August 5th, followed by students the next week, he wanted to get it cleaned up for their “first day back.”
“This is a main backroad for locals and we are very thankful for the City of Destin’s partnership on this,” continued Wagner. “We have identified 12 additional corners within the City of Destin that we would like to clean-up, and this will be the first one.”
The plan will be to remove all of the dying Holly trees and and replace them with Sand Live Oaks. New shrubs and pine straw will also be added.
“I think it’s fantastic that any organization is willing to put their own time and money into bettering the community,” said Destin City Councilman Kevin Schmidt. “I know that “Trees On The Coast” is doing a lot in other areas but they have plans that they want to work with the City Of Destin on and this is just the start of it.”
“It’s a busy road and intersection, and it’s busy for multiple reasons,” continued Schmidt. “Beach Drive is a heavily used road for locals and tourists to get to Joe’s Bayou. It’s also the intersection that parents and visitors park near and walk their kids across every single day to get to the school. It’s a highly trafficked area and it’s been an eyesore for a long time.”
According to Schmidt, there have been attempts in the past to clean that corner up but it has mainly been in the form of basic maintenance. The overhaul on August 3rd should bring some real long-term change to that corner.
How to help: Any volunteers looking to help with the clean-up are encouraged to just show up with gloves and a shovel, and the team will find something for you to help with.
For more info on Trees On The Coast, find them on Facebook.