Congratulations to the winner of our Tidy Kiwi Volunteer of the Month for October, Kayla Moxon.

Kayla is 10 years old and has been out nearly every day during lockdown cleaning up her rural road.

Kayla’s mum Donna says Kalya is out so often that the neighbours recognise her and give her a toot and a thumbs up as they go past.

A neighbouring farmer has offered to help Kayla out by letting her drop her rubbish bags off to them if they are too heavy to carry home, and they’ve also been inspired by Kayla to keep the roadside rubbish free outside their farm.

“Kayla has been offered pocket money for her work, which she has gratefully declined,” says Donna.

Kayla was nominated by Anna Petchell who started Keep Hamilton Beautiful. Anna says “Kayla is just a star! She’s picked up far more than her own weight in rubbish and needs to be rewarded. All of the neighbours recognise her now and she’s done an amazing job.”

Kayla says Anna inspired her to pick up rubbish after noticing so much on the road on her way home from school.

“I find picking up rubbish fun for some reason and it just makes the world a cleaner place. I meet people at community events that I would have not have met otherwise. I have found some weird things like tyres, shopping trolleys, clothes and even a swimming pool at community events. On our road the most common thing I pick up is beer bottles and takeaway wrappers.”

Kayla is so passionate about collecting litter she even asked for a pair of litter tongs for her birthday.

Congratulations Kayla, and thanks for being a Tidy Kiwi, looking after our environment, and inspiring others to help Keep New Zealand Beautiful.

This month’s Tidy Kiwi will receive $100, a Keep New Zealand Beautiful t-shirt, a Resene paint voucher and more – along with being automatically nominated for the Young Legend Award at our annual Beautiful Awards! Plus, thanks to Stand Desk we have four desks to give away this year to our Tidy Kiwi Volunteer of the Month winners – we will draw a winner for this every three months.

If you know someone who does great work keeping New Zealand beautiful, you can nominate them here.