SAN ANTONIO, TX – It appears that orange may be the new color for some girls who are used to wearing brown and green. Members of the Girl Scouts of Southwest Texas Troop 416 covered their uniforms with the day-glow orange vests of a highway crew as they began picking up trash along a stretch of Wiseman Road, outside Loop 1604.
The scouts have adopted a 1-mile stretch of Wiseman Road, along with the responsibility of keeping it free of litter. Tuesday morning, more than a dozen girls and their troop leaders put that plan into action.
"I want to make sure this road that we adopted is going to stay clean. It's going to stay healthy and no one is going to come out here and just throw random trash out here,” said Andrea Garza, a soon-to-be fourth-grader.
Evalyn Hoffman, a sixth-grader, agreed, saying it’s her way of giving back to her community.
"It means I'm making a big difference in the world,” she said. “Even though people won't notice it, one day they will and be grateful for it."
Armed with trash bags and gloves, the girls scoured both sides of Wiseman Road, stopping to pick up even the tiniest bits of discarded paper. Nearby, a blue diamond-shaped sign declared that their troop had adopted the 1-mile stretch of Northwest Bexar County.
"Our troop is really, really big on community service. What can we give back?,” said Tara Edwards, an assistant troop leader. “As individuals, we can give back a little. As a group, we can give back a lot."
Edwards said the idea to adopt the road came from the girls themselves.
"We're just really big supporters that a girl can do anything. So there are no limitations,” Edwards said.
Although doing community service can often lead to new merit badges for scouts, Edwards said there were no definite plans in that regard for her troop.
For more information on the Adopt a County Road Program, visit the Bexar County Public Works website.