By Karen Hall

Editor

Local women, including Mayor Barbara Woods, gathered in Rock Creek Park Monday morning to tidy up the landscaping in front of the Farmers Market pavilion.

They were members of the Beautification Committee. As a Three-Star community, Lewisburg is required to have a beautification committee, and it must undertake several projects every year.

"We want to be as good as we can be," said Pam Russell.

After the pavilion was built, Woods organized the landscaping of the strip of ground between the pavilion and Old Farmington Road.

"Who doesn't like something that's pretty?" asked Woods.

One of the things she planted was day lilies, and they have grown so well this week the women were thinning them out and taking some to transplant elsewhere.

Russell and Woods were helped by Lisa Jackson and Tina Lilly, and Tracy Tietgens and Mike Wiles were due to show up a little later.

"It's so much nicer then there's a crowd of us," Woods said.

Wearing gloves, she pulled up a poison oak vine and showed off its three leaves, then reminded herself not to touch bare skin with the gloves that had touched the weed.

After the group finished work, the Public Works Department was going to spray weedkiller and mulch the bed.

The Public Works Department has also helped the beautification committee improve the appearance of the Industrial Park on the east side of town.

Work at Rock Creek Park also counts as part of the Great American Cleanup, in which all 95 counties in Tennessee participate.

The City of Lewisburg got a $25,000 grant in 2006 for the construction of the Farmers Market pavilion, according to a Tribune article by community editor Greg Lowe. Among those pictured at the check-presentation ceremony taken while the pavilion was under construction are some who are still in politics, like Sen. Lamar Alexander, and some who have left office, like mayors Terry Wallace and Bob Phillips and U.S. Rep. Bart Gordon. Ever camera shy, former -- and current -- city manager Eddie Fuller is partly concealed in the back row of that picture.

The Farmers Market opened in the pavilion in 2006 and has been there every summer since, through good years and bad. In abundant years produce has been sold two days a week. The pavilion has also sheltered a variety of other events from Girl Scout parties to Goats Music and More concerts and a Democratic fish fry.

Woods has always been a gardener and beautifier of outdoor spaces. She's been responsible for much of the landscaping around the courthouse square. Often joined by Jackson, Woods can be seen on the square at different times of year, supervising the putting up and taking down of decorations, and caring for the trees and shrubs. Leaving the mayor's office next month will surely not lessen Woods' committment to the beautification of the city she calls home.