Mission

We promote a clean and beautiful Abilene by keeping it litter-free and preserving our natural environment. We empower residents to take initiative to beautify our hometown. We partner with public and private sector organizations and individuals who are similarly committed to our mission.

• 

History

Keep Abilene Beautiful has served Abilene for over 33 years. This organization was established in 1986 and filed for its 501(c)3 business status by the name of Abilene Clean & Proud. Abilene continues to be one of the best mid-sized cities in Texas to raise a family and retire due to cost of living and Keep Abilene Beautiful continues to engage and educate Abilenians in improving our community environment through beautification, litter reduction recycling and taking care of our most precious natural resource, water. All these years later we still serve our community and are committed to the beautification of Abilene.

Impact

Here in west Texas there isn’t a great deal of tree canopy. It is so important to build that canopy to capture and filter rainwater before it gets to our drainage system to reduce the pollution entering our water sources. Our focus in that area is to increase our tree canopy at public green spaces and public school campuses. Planting trees drastically improves the aesthetic appearance of the grounds making the space more inviting to the surrounding community; provides shade to cool down hot recreation spaces and create outdoor classroom space that can be used as a teaching tool. Each year Keep Abilene Beautiful partners with KAB member, AEP Texas, and the City Parks & Recreation Department to host a Texas Arbor Day event. We have one of the best volunteer bases any organization could hope for where the focus is on supporting community groups in the maintenance and improvement of our parks, streets, creeks, trails and neighborhoods. Our success is due to the hard work of our community leaders and volunteers that are committed to enhancing their neighborhoods; while we support them with resources, event and project planning.

Drought conditions in Abilene were so sever in the late 1980’s and again in the 90’s, early 2000’s that city leaders undertook a major plan to ensure our drinking water for years to come and focused heavily on education of the public regarding conservation of our most precious resource, WATER! Abilene receives its drinking water from 3 of the surrounding lakes and it is important that we take care of those water sources. Keep Abilene Beautiful works to shedding light on how everything is connected including what gets drained into our local waterways.

Keep Abilene Beautiful hosts regular waterway cleanups bringing neighbors and families out to enjoy the area; as well as, instill the importance of keeping them clean. It’s not just people from Abilene that come help with these cleanups. We have had volunteers from Merkel, Tye, Anson, Clyde, Winters and surrounding communities participate in these waterway cleanups.