By Sara Escobar
Harker Heights Evening Star

Since the late 1960s, Texas and its councilmembers has pledged to keep the state clean and beautiful by supplying Texas cities with information on how to improve its appearance. A non-profit organization was created to continue these efforts, known as the Beautify Texas Council, which would later go on to be called Keep Texas Beautiful in 1985. Keep Texas Beautiful now has the largest environmental and community improvement network in the state.
Nolanville City Manager, Kara Escajeda, is doing her part to ensure her town is kept to the same high standards. She carries this out by having the city participate in their own ‘Keep Nolanville Beautiful’, which focuses on public awareness and education, beautification and community improvement, as well as little prevention.
“I’ve worked as the city manager for almost two years,” says Escajeda, “And that’s how long we’ve had the city participating in Keep Nolanville Beautiful; this year we’re hosting a lot of events to keep the community involved. There will be a First Responder’s Holiday Parade at 1 o’clock on Saturday, December 17 in order to build pride in our emergency services. This isn’t the first year we’ve held this parade, but each year is always bigger and better than the last. There’s also a Christmas decorating contest, city hall will be taking entries on December 16, with the winners being announced at the parade. We wanted citizens to really get into the holiday spirit,” Escajeda also spoke about her regional training in Salado to encourage the efforts in ‘Keep Salado Beautiful’ last week.
This year, Nolanville has been named a certified scenic city by the state of Texas, an award that tells Escajeda that the city’s efforts are paying off. “It’s not only an amazing accomplishment for the city staff, but it’s a great sense of pride for the members of our great community, too,” says Escajeda.
This great recognition boosts Nolanville’s image, and in turn, also stimulates their growth. Escajeda’s highest regard is to win the prestigious Government’s Community Achievement Award. For over two decades, Keep Texas Beautiful, in affiliation with the Texas Department of Transportation, has granted this award to ten Texas communities with the best environmental program in the state each year.
The competition distributes $2 million in funding across the ten communities, which is then used for various landscaping projects. If Nolanville were to be recognized for the award, the city would receive over $100,000. The winners are expected to be announced in early spring of 2017.