What to Expect When You Adopt a Mile
As KPB’s executive director Patricia DePlasco says, “Our Adoption Program is the foundation of our organization.” When you join our free Adoption Program, you commit to a two-year agreement, during which you keep your mile litter-free. Our adoptee volunteers are an essential part in the ongoing stewardship that keeps Pinellas County beautiful, and we wouldn’t be able to protect our paradise without them.
Organize Your Group
We welcome groups of all kinds and individuals into our adoption program. Some adoptions are run by a family or a single person committed to cleaning their adopted mile. Others belong to businesses, associations, clubs, and other groups. Organize your people or go it alone, either way we can help.
Choose an Area
The most common way to choose an area is to find something near where you work, live, or gather. Give us your central address, and we’ll identify open spots that are available for adoption. Choose the one that works best for you.
Our two most popular mile adoption programs are Adopt-A-Mile (a mile of county road) and Adopt-A-Trail (a mile of the Pinellas Trail.) However, we also offer:
Adopt-a-Community (a mile with your home, school, or business in the center)
Adopt-an-Intracoastal-Island (perfect for people with kayaks, canoes, or power boats)
Adopt-a-Shore (a mile of shoreline)
Adopt-an-Alley (great for places near home that require consistent maintenance in the City of St. Petersburg)
Complete Four Cleanups a Year
Once you’ve adopted your mile, we ask for four cleanups a year, or one cleanup per quarter. Please note that the Pinellas Trail is an exception: we ask for six cleanups a year from Trail adoptees. You are, of course, welcome to complete more than that! (If you are a snowbird, we will work with your schedule on the once per quarter requirement.) There is no time requirement or litter collection requirement for each cleanup. If you go out for an hour and find a single piece of trash, that’s perfectly fine. If you want to go out for four hours because you’ve been filling bags and bags, also great!
Submit Your Data
Once you’ve done a cleanup, it’s time to submit your data to KPB. Send in your data by the end of the month during which the cleanup took place by filling out this simple form. You’ll tell us the date of your event, how many people participated, how long the cleanup was, and the weight of the trash you collected. If you don’t have a scale, we will give you guidelines on how to best estimate your trash weight.
We encourage you to take pictures during your cleanup and share them with us! You can email them directly to KPB, or you can share them on social media by tagging @keeppinellasbeautiful and using the hashtag #dobeautifulthings.
If you’re interested in adopting a mile or want to find out more about the program, please fill out our inquiry form.