By Leslie W. Colley
Every day there seemed to be more trash on the sidewalks. An East Atlanta resident watched her aging dogs, who were losing their ability to walk, stumble into it on their daily walks. She thought about parents with strollers trying to navigate around the piles. And she kept asking herself the same question: who’s going to pick this up?
“Then one day I realized: maybe it’s me,” says the founder of Neighbors for Safer Sidewalks, who is more interested in building the movement than taking credit for it.
She started on her own street. Little by little, she extended her reach until she was maintaining the entire route of her daily dog walk through East Atlanta. She’d been at it for about three years when, in 2023, the streetscape receptacles at MARTA stops along the Flat Shoals/Bouldercrest corridor vanished. With roughly one public trash can remaining per mile of sidewalk in the area, trash began piling up fast.
She talked to her neighbors, who explained the bind they’re in. Passengers are not allowed to board with open food or drink containers, and if the wastebin on the bus is full, they face a tough choice: ditch their waste on the spot, or risk being refused passage. She took the issue to DeKalb County and the City of Atlanta, but neither agreed to reinstall the missing receptacles.
When her dogs passed in 2025, she found herself with time on her hands and decided to put it to work. She reached out to Keep Atlanta Beautiful about its Adopt-a-Spot program and now maintains seven spots across NPU-W neighborhoods like East Atlanta, Grant Park, Ormewood Park and Glenwood Park, all cleaned at least monthly. The program provides litter grabbers, gloves, trash bags and bulk pickup service as needed.
As her activism grew, it needed a name. She first called it Ollie’s Walk, in memory of her late dog Oliver. But as she began partnering with more fellow residents, she landed on something that invites collaboration: Neighbors for Safer Sidewalks, or Neighbors for short.
The organization, whose Instagram page has already drawn more than 1,000 followers, is rooted in the Strong Towns framework, an urban planning and civic approach to building stronger communities from the bottom up. Plans are in the works to apply for nonprofit status, launch a website and build an app, and residents have already begun reaching out to ask how they can get involved.
“Sometimes we need to be reminded that we can just do stuff,” she says. “We can go outside and pick up that piece of trash we see. We don’t have to become experts or devote our whole lives to a cause to make a difference.”
In that spirit, Neighbors has launched a movement called Sunday Service encouraging area residents to go outside for one hour each Sunday to pick up litter, no signup required. “All you need to make our neighborhood better is an hour, a glove and a bag.”
The work goes beyond litter. Neighbors also clears sidewalks and ADA ramps overtaken by grass, weeds and runoff mud. It’s recently expanded into bicycle lane cleaning every Thursday through a collaboration with SOPO Bicycle Cooperative and Atlanta Magnet Man. And in August, Neighbors began fabricating and placing benches at bus stops that lack accessibility seating.
Born right here in NPU-W, Neighbors anticipates future collaborations with groups beyond our borders, like the Reynoldstown Rangers. For now, though, there’s plenty of work to do and an open invitation to help. Follow @neighborsforsafersidewalks on Instagram to explore resources or submit a cleanup request.
