The Tennessee Delta Alliance (TDA), a Tennessee Department of Transportation program housed at the University of Memphis within the Center for Regional Economic Enrichment, was named Non-Profit Recycler of the Year by the Tennessee Recycling Coalition.
The awards were presented at the recent Tennessee Sustainability Conference where it recognized individuals, organizations and businesses in Tennessee that have demonstrated a commitment to and outstanding achievement in waste prevention and recycling.
“TDA is very thankful for receiving this honor from Tennessee Recycling Coalition,” said TDA Director Edmond McDavis III. “We have received great support from each of the five counties in West Tennessee which include Dyer, Lake, Lauderdale, Shelby and Tipton that we host events in, and look forward to continued positive impact on ecotourism, volunteer engagement and education along Great River Road in Tennessee and beyond.”
Established in 2022, Tennessee Delta Alliance is a Byway Management Organization with a dual-purpose to manage the Great River Road National Scenic Byway and a water-based, regional Keep America Beautiful alignment. In July 2024, TDA became only the second ever river based Keep America Beautiful Affiliate, with the first being Keep the Tennessee River Beautiful.
Under the leadership of McDavis, who received the award on behalf of TDA, the Tennessee Delta Alliance is actively involved in litter prevention and environmental stewardship education in the Mississippi River Delta in Tennessee including impacts in waste diversion in the community, unique programs to capture recyclable materials, showcasing the educational success of their program, and demonstrating the ability of the program to be modeled in other communities.
McDavis leads the program with an emphasis on improving ecotourism in five counties in Tennessee that intersect with the Mississippi River. TDA actively highlights tourism locations via their campaigns on their Facebook and YouTube channel Great River Road Tennessee. “There is a true correlation between having clean communities and tourism, as folks want to visit places that are clean,” McDavis said.
Fighting single plastic use, the program periodically hands out reuseable water bottles and grocery bags. They’ve also collected nearly 23,000 of trash, with ten more cleanups on the schedule.
“This is a record high for our organization, we look forward to seeing how much we can collect this year. I’m also proud of the pollinator gardens that we assist with, as pollinators are very important to the environment. We sponsor pollinator gardens in Shelby and Dyer currently, and are helping create a new one in Tipton,” McDavis said.
Other highlights for 2026 include:
Awareness Events
- Number of Events: 6 (hosted in Shelby-4, Lake-1, and Lauderdale-1)
- Volunteers: 159
- Hours: 574
- Items passed out: 100 truck tarps; 1,000 pollinator scavenger hunt puzzles from TDOT; 75 native trees
Cleanup Events
- Number of Events: 11 (hosted in Lake-1, Shelby-4, Tipton-3, Dyer-1, Lauderdale-1, and Haywood-1)
- Volunteers: 520
- Hours: 932
- Plants planted: 80
- Trees planted: 1,575
- Pounds of Trash Collected: 22,888
- Tires collected: 78
- Miles of Hwy Cleaned: 25.4
Caleb Powell, Tennessee Sustainability Conference director and TRC chairman of the board, along with TRC Executive Director Amber Greene, presented the awards during the annual conference held at Gatlinburg’s Park Vista Hotel. The collaborative event was organized by TRC, the TN Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Tennessee Environmental Conference.
To get involved with TDA, please visit their Facebook page.
Watch an episode of TDA’s Great River Road Tennessee during their visit to the C.H. Nash Museum at the Prehistoric Chucalissa Archaeological Site.
