MOBILE, Ala. — A longtime volunteer leader is taking the helm of Mobile County’s anti-litter program. Keep Mobile Beautiful has named Miranda Radcliff program coordinator for Love Your Community, the county’s award-winning litter abatement, beautification and environmental stewardship program.
Radcliff is no newcomer to the effort. She has served for several years as a Love Your Community team leader, giving her firsthand experience with how the program works on the ground and with the volunteers who power it.
What the new coordinator will do
As program coordinator, Radcliff will oversee the day-to-day work of keeping Love Your Community running and growing. Her responsibilities include:
- Volunteer recruitment and management: bringing new teams into the program and supporting those already taking part
- Community events: coordinating cleanups and other events across Mobile County
- Marketing and communications: getting the word out about the program and its results
- Educational outreach: working with schools, municipalities and community organizations to teach about litter prevention and environmental stewardship
Her background as a team leader means she has been on the other side of the work: organizing volunteers, picking up litter, logging hours and turning those hours into community projects.
How Love Your Community began
Love Your Community launched in 2018, championed by Mobile County Commissioner Connie Hudson, to engage residents in tackling litter, protecting local waterways and beautifying communities throughout Mobile County. The program was created through a collaboration among the Mobile County Commission, Keep Mobile Beautiful and the Alabama Coastal Heritage Trust.
Under the program, registered volunteer teams choose areas to look after and document their cleanups. Mobile County has supplied teams with equipment such as litter grabbers, safety T-shirts, vests, gloves and disposable bags.
The program paused during the COVID-19 pandemic and relaunched on Earth Day 2021 with a new approach: a Time Bank model that lets participating teams earn grant funding for community improvement projects based on the volunteer hours they put in.
How the Time Bank works
The Time Bank rewards volunteers for the time they already give. Teams log hours spent on eligible activities — litter cleanup, beautification, recycling and other environmental stewardship work in public spaces — and bank those hours toward a grant.
According to the program’s guidelines, there is no monthly limit on how many hours a team may bank, and banked hours do not expire, rolling over from year to year. When a team has accumulated enough hours to reach the grant award it wants, it can “cash in” those hours. Grants are awarded after the team’s project narrative is received and approved by the Mobile County Commission. The awards are grants, not loans, and do not have to be repaid as long as the team carries out the project it proposed.
That structure lets volunteer teams decide for themselves what their community needs and then earn the money to make it happen.
Results since the relaunch
Since the 2021 relaunch, approximately 250 teams have taken part in Love Your Community, earning about $75,000 in grants for community improvement projects through their volunteer work.
Recent awards show the range of projects teams take on. In July 2026, the county announced $5,500 in grants to five teams, including:
- Father and Daughter Team Up 2 Clean Up, $1,500, for a cleanup in Trinity Gardens
- Lady Litter Gitters, $1,500, for clubhouse beautification including a sprinkler system and protective cover
- Trinity Gardens Community Action Team, $1,000, for television recycling and e-cycling education
- Sisters Team Up 2 Clean Up, $1,000, for a community recycling event with education
- Ladies Against Litter, $500, for landscaping and shrub installation
“What I love most about this program is that it is resident-driven,” Hudson said when those grants were announced. “Teams identify a need, volunteer to improve their community, and earn the resources to turn those ideas into projects with lasting improvements.”
Award-winning program
Love Your Community has drawn statewide recognition. In 2021, the program earned the Efficiency and Innovation Award from the Association of County Commissions of Alabama in the urban category for counties with populations of more than 50,000.
How it is funded
The Mobile County Commission funds the Love Your Community litter abatement program through the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act, known as GOMESA, and the program is administered by Keep Mobile Beautiful.
GOMESA is a federal law that shares a portion of revenue from offshore oil and gas leasing in the Gulf with the four Gulf-producing states — Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas — and their coastal political subdivisions. Those funds are intended for purposes such as coastal conservation, restoration and protection, which makes litter abatement and waterway protection a fitting use.
Why litter matters on the Gulf Coast
Litter is more than an eyesore in Mobile County. Trash dropped along roadsides and in neighborhoods often washes into ditches, creeks and rivers during heavy rain, and from there into Mobile Bay and the Gulf. That makes neighborhood cleanups a frontline defense for the waterways that support the area’s fishing, seafood and tourism economies.
Litter has been a recurring concern for local leaders. Mobile City Council members have discussed tougher approaches to litterers and illegal dumping, as reported in our earlier story, “Tires on the Roads, Cameras in the Trees: Mobile Council Wants Litterers Shamed on TV.”
How to get involved
Residents who want to form a team or join the effort can find registration and program information at loveyourcommunity.com.
With a former team leader now in the coordinator’s role, the program’s volunteers will be working with someone who knows their work from the inside.