Keep Okaloosa Beautiful was certified as a local affiliate of the Keep America Beautiful and Keep Florida Beautiful organizations on February 7th 2023. Our mission is to promote environmental awareness and educate the community on how to reduce litter from our natural resources, beautify our recreational and private areas, improve recycling efforts, and keep our county beautiful.

Keep Okaloosa Beautiful sees a future where every community within Okaloosa County is clean, green, and beautiful! We strive to see our residents partake in efforts which support a healthy and inviting place to live. If you would like to participate in clean ups, tree plantings, recycling events and more please request a volunteer form by emailing: khiemier@myokaloosa.com.

Goals

· End littering

· Improve recycling

· Beautify communities

· Restore native habitats

Clean-Ups/ Litter Prevention: Keep Okaloosa Beautiful hosts cleanups along city and county roads. Every year KOB must complete the litter index survey also known as the "Community Appearance Index". This survey consists of four volunteers assisting the Executive Director in judging 50 sites within Okaloosa on a scale of 1 to 4. With 1 being not littered or very mild litter (1-2 pieces) up to 4 being illegal dump site or heavily littered. Throughout the year these 50 sites will be monitored and cleaned in hopes that the community starts to see a sense of ownership, to deter from continuous littering. While we do focus on our sites within the litter index, we do go out to locations requested by the public as long as they are not on private property.

To see a list of or if you would like to participate in a Keep Okaloosa Beautiful clean-up please click HERE .

This public story map features information related to the Keep Okaloosa Beautiful program such as site locations and status, list of scheduled and completed sites, site litter index scores, and site images. Within this story map is the "Keep Okaloosa Beautiful" web map with location information and the "Keep Okaloosa Beautiful Chart" dashboard that contains graphs and lists related to the cleanup locations.