The Durant Sustainability Coalition celebrated with a ribbon cutting from the Durant Area Chamber of Commerce last week at Mickle Law Office.
The mission of DSC includes educating citizens in sustaining the region’s natural resources and to make the city more pedestrian and bicycle friendly.
Jeremy Spence is the board chair of DSC, and he said the organization is three years old.
“Our ribbon cutting has just been on hiatus because we didn’t really have a reason … we’re not a typical organization,” Spence said, during an interview. “So, when the opportunity came around to celebrate so many community partners, we decided, you know what? Let’s take this opportunity to celebrate all those that got us here. We decided make our ribbon cutting about celebrating the partnerships, all of the relationships that help us build what we’re doing.”
One of the projects is planting trees in the downtown and other areas. That project was funded by a grant through T-Mobile. DSC is receiving more grants from the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust (TSET) to be able to have more expansions of environmental and sustainable activities within the community.
“We’ve been able to take that money which is going towards more mobility, more move-ability around our city and ways of walking and biking and so those are next steps of what we’re working on,” Spence said. “That’s the next big thing that’s on the radar here.”
Spence said the tree planting is going fantastic.
“Twenty-one trees in ground,” he said. “I think our most exciting project from this is we’re able to do a new tree park over in front of Alliance hospital,” Spence said. “Durant Rotary also has some benches there and we’re coordinating that with a new cement pad as well. Alliance-Health is going to have this grass area have additional trees and benches and walkways, not only for hospital employees and guests, but the teachers across the street. The other clinics that are there in the area as well, so it will be a nice communal space to walk and enjoy.”
Kara Byrd, executive director of the Durant Area Chamber of Commerce, said she was grateful to celebrate this day. She recalled when she first met Mark Mesiti-Miller and Donna Murphy of DSC.
“I was at Imagine Durant and I instantly knew they were my people,” Byrd said. “Like I told them, ‘You’re part of my tribe.’ Obviously now, I’m in a different role at the chamber but I know whenever they first came on, the chamber was working with Clean and Green and really with the partnerships that came on through the Durant Sustainability Coalition that just got new life. It has so much more energy that was breathed into it and we cannot thank you enough for the investment you guys have made into our community to truly make Durant a cleaner, greener, friendlier town.
“We are so grateful for everything that you’ve done and the way that you have partnered with so many of our community stakeholders to make a difference. Not just for this time, but generations to come. That can’t happen without collaboration and I know that you’ve done that with so many different organizations, not just the city and the county, but with Durant Trails and Open Space and Main Street and the Chamber.“ Spence also spoke of the Choctaw Nation recycling program that he said is a huge endeavor.
“We’re on our way to curbside recycling,” Spence said. “That’s an option that we’re really striving for and then water. We really want to make sure that our waterways are clean. We’re appreciative of our natural resources that’s very abundant here but we need to make sure that we keep that preserved for future generations.”
Murphy thanked those who helped with the recent sidewalk clearing.
“A week ago, we worked with the Boys & Girls Club,” Murphy said. “We had four adults, and I don’t know how many children and we cleaned 932 feet of sidewalks. But the city provided the Dumpsters and all kinds of moral support, and we couldn’t do it without them. The same for the trash pick-up. Everything we do is in partnership with someone else and we thank you because there’s only five of us otherwise.”
Mesiti-Miller said DSC is an organization that grew out of the community.
“I remember really clearly about three and a half years ago on the coldest day of the year and it was icy and it was freezing and we had an environmental meet and greet at the Massey Building right down the street and over 75 people showed up,” Mesiti-Miller said. “After that event, Kara Byrd and Donna and Libby (Callicoat, Durant Green School Coordinator) and a few other people that were kind of helping set that up, we looked at each other and went, ‘Oh my gosh, something’s going on here. Maybe we should start an organization.’ So, we did. We started DSC and we committed to educating and energizing the community.
Callicoat said the Durant Green School program that she founded is in its tenth year.
