School started last week for my wife (second-grade teacher) and children. Same buildings within Alliance Public Schools for all three. Perhaps the most interesting part was walking through the halls in the entirety of AMS again. The only member of my family who does not spend hours each weekday in a classroom, I still feel the reverberation of teachers’ voices echoing decades later. Especially this month, I hear, “The fair is in August,” when somebody during second period complained about homework on the first day. Fast forward and, yes, the fair is still in August – one of the best harbingers of the upcoming school year.
Keep Alliance Beautiful has been involved in the Box Butte County Fair to some degree for years. This year Kathy Worley, our executive director, passed out informational/swag bags along the parade route. Also, our painted, stick-your-head-through-the-hole and get your picture taken attraction was on hand in one of the buildings. Work and fair intersected for me personally on the evening of family night. My son helped me gather a load to make room in the trailer for cardboard stationed at Hemingford and hook up our other trailer, which was full of recyclables, to bring back to Alliance. I was up there anyway that Tuesday, so it was more efficient for me to take the load southeast. The morning shift changed out the black bins and returned to our spot on Village property between the towering Farmer’s Co-op elevator and the public 9-hole golf course.
KAB proposed locating our trailers at the fairgrounds year round though the potential traffic was not desirable, their board explained. Therefore after a high profile parking spot at the former mini mart where everybody heading through town on Nebraska Highway 2 passes, KAB serves the community from a nondescript site. Like the move in Alliance from the Alliance Plaza (also on Highway 2) to Second Street and Cheyenne Avenue, people in Hemingford are unlikely to find/use the trailers unless they ask or already know where to go.
My goal is to have both Hemingford trailers at the fair for the final four days as people visit for grandstand events, 4-H shows and stream onto the grounds after the Saturday parade. An informational kiosk could stand nearby to educate the public while reducing how much waste leaves for the landfill that week. I am sure KAB and the fair board would be agreeable to finding another way to promote environmental education and sustainability.
Youth exemplified those issues in certain 4-H and open class entries this summer. In the former, an Alliance teen recycled newspaper to craft a bodice, while her peers modeled “upcycle simple garments” in a county only project. Judges recognized junior and senior 4-H bakers for “best use of recycled materials” on their cookie jars. Other projects qualified for the upcoming Nebraska State Fair at Grand Island with descriptions such as “accessory – recycled item” or “upcycled item” and “furniture – recycled/remade”.
Maintaining clean grounds has potential for KAB, however everyone involved already does fine (overall) in that category. One evening, while sitting down for supper at the food court, I overheard a man complaining that there were no trashcans amongst the tables. Others at his table referred him to a pair of open Dumpsters a few yards away that he visited minutes later. Unlike the constant, often overflowing garbage receptacles KAB empties along Box Butte during Heritage Days, my take was the fair crowds knew how to pick up after themselves and did not expect the service from anyone else.
Still 11 months away, the 2024 Box Butte County Fair could say “aloha” to the environment as the next theme. I would love to see the commercial building open again and packed with businesses and not for profits telling visitors all about being green. If you have forgotten where the kids stuffed their pockets full of free pens and candy, I’m sure you’ll see the Hemingford recycling trailers at the north door.