Beautiful Newark 2007 Campaign

The goal of the youth-led campaign is to lead, educate and inspire us to change the perception and reputation of our city with a dramatic effort to plant 1 million flowers.

With the help of dozens of Beautiful Newark Partners, students partake in positive, empowering activities that demonstrate their talent and treasures.

Beautiful Newark Partnership

In order to mobilize the entire community into action, a collaborative effort of both public and private sector organizations was formed.

The Recognition

Any conversation about making Newark even more beautiful has to start with how many organizations have done so much— and are doing so much—already. None of us is inventing anything. We can only join in the effort of so many unselfish people and stand on the shoulders of leaders who have done the great work. From the Greater Newark Conservancy, Weequahic and Branch Brook Park Alliance and the many neighborhood associations, companies and non-profits who have sponsored so many cleanups and projects, its incredible. The website www.beautifulnewark.org will have a special section to shine a spotlight on group after group doing great stuff and nominations are welcome.

The Reality

Newark has an unfair reputation. There is so much that is beautiful about our city, starting with the people, from children to seniors who are our greatest beauty, not just parks or architecture. But the fact is, many of our streets have litter. If we’re being honest there is garbage in places it shouldn’t be. We can blame some outsiders for dumping and littering, and that has to be stopped. But the truth is most litter comes from us, all ages, all walks of life and only we can stop it. The entrances to the city and many other things can be as beautiful as we choose to make and keep them.

The Lesson Learned

On the first Saturday in October, students and leaders from more than 115 locations coordinated a beautification project for One Day, from schools to neighborhood groups to faith communities, listed on the website. It was a wonderful day followed by a great celebration, music and donated food with the Mayor and others at Branch Brook Park. The top project in Baxter Terrace was voted a $10,000 prize from the Newark Alliance. In school, students learn about beautification in lessons. But here’s the hard lesson, no matter how much litter you pick up in one place, a street just gets dirty again and it’s so discouraging, it can feel like why try. Was the day a failure? Only if we don’t learn the lesson.

Why This Issue, Why Now?

There are so many bigger and more important issues in Newark that we are all working on, why the push for beautification? Superintendent Marion Bolden first raised it with Mayor Booker and leaders like Joe D, Congressman Payne and others.

1. The issue is winnable.
2. Everyone, from the littlest ones, can play a key role.
3. It is a symbol that Newark is improving, gives us even more confidence.

Students began to help shape the concept and plan the marketing campaign. From there, other leaders joined in, Keith Kinard of Newark Housing Authority, George Warrington of NJ Transit. Ministers, business leaders. The Star Ledger donated $100,000 worth of advertising! Different people are now donating their talents and their expertise, like Tritonic doing the ads and The League providing office space and infrastructure. Newark Now is helping with the Super Neighborhoods. We want to take advantage of youth leadership and a common goal we can all share.

The Story of Lanes in Sweden

Changing the mindset and look of the city is like pushing a boulder up a hill. If we do a little and stop, what happens? It just rolls back down (over our feet!). What can we do that would be dramatic and have, as the students say, pop? Here is a true story. In Sweden they used to drive on the left side of the road, like England, in the 30’s, the 40s, the 50s, while the countries around them in Continental Europe drove on the right side of the road like we do. Logically, they realized they should switch but they never did because they couldn’t do it “gradually,” it was too hard, and they didn’t have enough leadership to make it all happen. Then some leaders got together and took charge and said let’s pick a moment. They picked Sep. 3, 1967 at 4:45 in the morning as the moment to switch. They had a big campaign months leading up to make sure everyone in the country knew. That night, by law, if you were on the road you had to exit the left lane at 4:45 in the morning, pull off the road for 10 minutes, then pull back on and use the right lane. It worked and was an amazing success.

The Big Idea

What if we want to “switch lanes” from having Newark streets with sometimes litter and not as pretty to a city that is famous for being clean and beautiful? What if we all become the leaders who take charge, that the history books talk about? Working with the kids, our moment is Earth Day. On that day, one hour before school ends, each class, meaning the teacher, students and any parents and adult who want to volunteer, will go to a specific street next to their school and pick up all the litter and start planting a million flowers. The real focus, though, is the campaign leading up to it, where the kids help us all change our mindset that we can all pick up a piece of litter if we see one once in a while. We can all stand up and be leaders, not let anyone else litter. And we can all own up, “own” a specific section of a specific street that we have adopted and keep clean.

The Big Day

Earth Day is the day where students not only learn history, they make history. 42,000 kids taking one hour out of the school day to do a living lesson in civics. The largest civic beautification project ever done in the USA in history. Can we help them succeed? Will we achieve picking up all the litter? Will we achieve planting one million flowers or will we fail? We already have interest from national media, some drama, to see if we are successful. How many adults will join in and help for an hour? What special projects can be done at all the entrances to the city? How about the big public buildings? Downtown? The parks? It’s all up to us and the good news is that some of the most powerful leaders in the whole city are behind this, letting the kids take the leadership and credit but using their clout to make it work. We already have other cities wanting to join in. Afterwards, there is a party for all volunteers, location to be announced. Who is really running this? In terms of neighborhood level groups, more than a hundred schools and other entities participated in the pilot event, One Day and they are listed on the website. A Beautiful Newark Partnership has been formed, with the following city wide entities and more joining:

From One Day to Every Day

Of course, the key to real success is making it last. No matter how much we clean that day, the true campaign is the next day. On Monday morning, will we each, when we see litter forming, pick up one piece? If we don’t, it won’t. If we do, the whole city will stay beautiful. History is sometimes about moments and that moment is here.

Press Releases

4/16/07 ~ Earth Day in Newark: April 20, 2007

10/24/06 ~ Stop Shootin’ named $10,000 richer