The Starkville artist, dressed in a white pantsuit littered with scraps of newspaper and construction paper, presented her “Make Starkville Sparkle” anti-litter campaign to the mayor and Board of Aldermen during a meeting Tuesday night.
McReynolds-Davis wants the city to pass a $1,000 fine or require 12 hours of community service for anyone caught littering.
She said while she doesn’t think her $1,000 fine ordinance has much of a chance of passing, she does want to see Starkville residents get more concerned about litter.
“Starkville should be neat, clean and attractive, but I’m here to tell you that Starkville is ugly and unkempt,” she said.
McReynolds-Davis said she wants the city to look as clean as Mississippi State University’s campus.
McReynolds-Davis, the wife of Ward 2 Alderman Frank Davis, presented the board with several pieces of “evidence”-plastic bags filled with Coke cans and cigarette butts that she picked up on Main Street.
When she reached the climax of her presentation, she called Starkville resident Richard Mullenax to the front of the boardroom to help pluck the bits of trash she had taped to her outfit. “I’m tired of being trashy,” she said.
“I think of Starkville as a lady, charming and elegant, and a lady does not throw down trash,” she said. “Let’s make Starkville sparkle.”
Mullenax said he walks around his neighborhood nearly every day picking up litter.
“I drive down University Drive frequently and it’s trashy, it’s dirty and there’s garbage all over the place,” he said. “I think Starkville deserves better than that.”
Cindy Harris, a librarian at the Mitchell Memorial Library, had a different idea for cleaning up the city.
“I don’t see why people in the county jail can’t get up at 5 o’clock on a Saturday morning and walk down Main Street for two hours and pick up trash,” she said.