By Nicole Daughhetee
Staff Reporter

EASLEY — If you’ve driven through Easley on Calhoun Memorial Highway recently, chances are you’ve noticed that the center island median between Bi-Lo and Ingles has had a dramatic facelift, thanks to SCBT’s participation in Partners in Pride.

The Easley Junior Women’s Club has sponsored a center island by Publix, near the Brushy Creek overpass along U.S. 123, and it is currently under construction.
Presented during Easley’s state of the city address this February, the Partners in Pride Program, an initiative designed to create aesthetically pleasing green space along Highway 123, is now under way.

City administrator Fox Simons said that Easley’s Partners in Pride program is being modeled after the Spots of Pride program in Spartanburg County.
“We want to beautify the city,” Simons said.

Eight areas have been identified to be included in the public and private partnership to beautify high-traffic areas that are main entry points into and through the city of Easley.

Partners in Pride works simply and effectively. Businesses, civic organizations, individuals, or foundations adopt a site and financially sponsor the landscaping and maintenance of the area they have chosen to adopt.

Once the median area is adopted, it is equipped with an irrigation system to aid in maintenance, and the physical appearance is transformed with flowers, trees, shrubbery and decorative rocks.

The organizations maintaining the site will be recognized with signs bearing their business name along that particular stretch of roadside.

It is a win-win situation for both the city and the organizations who decide to participate in Easley’s Partners for Pride, Simons said.

“Besides the benefit of civic pride, these organizations are allowed to place advertising signage for the traveling public to see,” said Simons. “With about 70,000 vehicles traveling U.S. 123 each day, that’s a lot of eyes.”

If your business or organization is interested in adopting one of these areas or would like more information about the Partners in Pride Project, please call Easley City Hall at (864) 855-7900.

“We’re very excited about this project taking off,” said Simons. “We’d like to continue to see it grow.”