EDITORIAL: Downtown planter project has potential

Published 11:00 am Wednesday, July 13, 2022

Several weeks ago, Milledgeville Main Street put out a call for community members to help beautify downtown by taking part in the Adopt-A-Planter program. Locals were asked to “adopt” one of the downtown planters by purchasing plants and donating their time for the upkeep. 

The project is being entirely maintained by members of the community. Several entities have answered the call and the response has been resoundingly positive with more than half of the 50 planters adopted thus far. 

Churches, individuals, businesses, civic organizations and others have stepped in. 

Each has agreed to adopt for 12 months, purchase the plants and maintain them for their planters.

According to Main Street, the first planter was adopted and completed before the call for help was ever publicized. 

It’s so great to see this project gaining such momentum, helping generate local buy-in and demonstrating care and concern in downtown’s appearance. 

Clean streetscapes are inviting to visitors and help draw people into a community, a welcome mat of sorts. 

This project could be a catalyst for other beautification efforts around town. 

There are certainly other parts of town that could use it. The Adopt-A-Planter program could be the start of something much bigger. 

It would be great to see it go beyond downtown, zeroing in on other sections of the community and other kinds of adoption projects. 

Kudos to those local businesses and individuals who are chipping in to spruce up the view outside their windows. We hope this idea will spread.