There were about 170 people in attendance when Jeff McManus, director of landscaping services for the University of Mississippi’s Oxford campus, came to speak to community leaders and city workers about taking ownership and pride in their town.
One city employee in particular, Braden Little, was moved by the presentation.
“I was listening to some of the ideas he was saying like take pride in your work and show good effort in what you do,” Little told The E-T recently. “So I went home that night and thought about it, and I came up with a department called trash division.”
It was an idea Little had been toying with for a while, but this seemed like the right time to flesh it out.
Little started out as a public works employee almost eight years ago with the City of Indianola.
The department always has a backlog of items to tend to like potholes, water leaks and such.
But Little has always noticed the trash dumped in and around the city streets and businesses, and he’d always wanted to do something about it.
March 2020 was his chance.
“I talked with the mayor and spoke with Mrs. Robin Rosenthal, and they said it was a good idea,” Little said.
The only problem was finding the labor to do it.
Little, who was Indianola Chamber Main Street’s Public Works Employee of the Year in 2019, had an answer for that too, and that was to use inmate labor.
He met with the Mississippi Department of Corrections, and an agreement was reached.
Only problem is that it was March of 2020. COVID-19 hit, and although it did not delay the start of the city’s trash division, it hampered the city’s ability to utilize inmate labor.
For the last eight months, however, Little said the city has been using labor through the state’s restitution program.
This spring, he expects to be back in full swing with traditional inmate labor.
Little said the trash division has been focused on the entire town.
“We are focused on north and south ends of town,” he said. “It’s not one end of town. It’s actually both sides. The south side is in worse shape than the north side.’
Little said workers start cleaning before dawn, but his projects start long before that.
“I start my projects in the evening time,” he said. “I go look and see what needs to be done.”
Little has been so successful in his first year that other towns are starting to come calling, wanting to know how he got the trash division started.
Starkville officials, for instance, came to town in March, he said, to quiz him about his success.
“They wanted to know how I came up with the program,” Little said. “What it takes and what they needed to do.”
For now, Little is staying focused on his town and his mission to keep the streets clean.
“My goal is to make sure this town is beautified and upkept and is outstanding,” Little said.
