Three Hours, One Courtyard, and a Bin: The Braves Day of Service at Betty Gray Middle

A green Bin There Dump That roll off dumpster on the service lot behind Betty Gray Middle School in Mableton, Georgia, beside the school trash compactor. — Our bin on the service lot at Betty Gray Middle School, beside the school’s own compactor.

In December 2023 the Atlanta Braves spent a day of service at Betty Gray Middle School in Mableton, one of the district’s Hank Aaron All-Star Schools. Volunteers painted. They cleaned up the outdoor courtyard. They worked in classrooms alongside teachers and spent time with students. Amerigroup and Sunny and Ranney were there with them.

We were the part nobody photographs. We put a bin on the back lot and hauled it away, at no cost to the school.

Why a courtyard cleanup needs a dumpster

A school already has a compactor. It is sized for cafeteria trash and classroom bins, emptied on a schedule, and it is not meant for what comes out of a courtyard rebuild in a single afternoon.

A beautification day produces the wrong kind of volume at the wrong time. Old mulch and bedding soil. Pulled shrubs and overgrown plantings. Broken concrete edging and cracked pavers. Rotted timbers. Whatever was behind the shed. A volunteer crew can fill a bin in a few hours, and none of it fits a compactor built for bagged waste.

So the choice is either a long string of pickup trips to a transfer station, or one bin that sits on the lot and leaves when the work is done. The bin is cheaper, it is faster, and it means the volunteers spend the day on the courtyard instead of in traffic.

A roll off dumpster positioned on the paved service area behind a brick school building in Mableton, Georgia. — The compactor handles the school’s daily trash. Courtyard debris needed something else.

Placement is most of the job at a school

A school lot is a harder placement than a driveway, and it is worth saying why, because it is the same thinking we bring to a tight residential job.

Fire lanes have to stay clear. Bus loops and car rider lines cannot be blocked, and at a middle school those run on a tight schedule. The dock and the compactor need their own access, because the school’s regular hauler still comes. And the surface has to be protected, since school lots are often older asphalt with soft patches.

That is what our 100% Driveway Protection is for. It is the same setup we put down on a homeowner’s driveway, and it is the reason we can park on a surface somebody else has to live with afterward.

A Bin There Dump That hook lift truck carrying a green roll off dumpster. — Same truck, same driver, same bin we would bring to your house.

Why we take these

We are a local, veteran owned company running our own trucks and our own drivers out of Douglasville. When a school in a territory we serve has a volunteer day and nowhere to put the debris, the cost to us is one bin and one haul.

We have done the same for NARI Cares projects, for Paws Atlanta, and for Douglas County September Saturdays. You can read about more of the community work we do, and if you need a bin in town, here is dumpster rental in Mableton.

If you are organizing a volunteer day in the Atlanta area and the debris is the part nobody has solved yet, get in touch. That part is easy for us.