Oxford resident Rayna Matthews wins state award for composting project

Oxford resident Rayna Matthews earned a first-place award from Keep Mississippi Beautiful for the composting work behind the Oxford Community Garden, a recognition that points to a practical local payoff: less waste headed to landfills and more material returned to the soil.

The City of Oxford’s May 5, 2026 agenda listed the honor as a first-place affiliate award for a population under 40,000. That puts Matthews’ work in the context of a city-size category, but the impact is rooted in a small patch off Bramlett Boulevard next to the Community Pavilion, where the garden first took root in 2009.

The Oxford Community Garden Association says Susie Adams worked with city leaders to secure the site, and the first seeds were planted in April 2009. Since then, the garden has aimed to grow fresh produce, provide locally grown food to people in need, increase social interaction and create an educational garden. Its Community Harvest Plots have donated produce to The Oxford Pantry since April 2010.

The composting system that drew the award was provided through a grant secured by the City of Oxford from Keep Mississippi Beautiful and Toyota. The garden says it can now make its own compost, and its resources page tells participants to place plant waste, not weeds, in a designated barrel for shredding. That makes the project easy to understand and easy to copy, especially for neighborhood gardens, school plots and residents who want to keep kitchen scraps and yard waste out of the trash stream.

Keep Mississippi Beautiful says its awards program recognizes affiliates, corporate partners and individual volunteers for cleaner, greener and more beautiful communities. In Oxford, the recognition landed on a project that already has a built-in public benefit: the garden’s harvested produce supports The Oxford Pantry, while its composting work turns organic material into something useful instead of disposable.

The city says about one-third of landfill material is compostable and offers a food-scrap composting service to residents, giving the garden project broader relevance beyond Bramlett Boulevard. The Oxford Community Garden also holds community work days on the first Saturday of every month, another opening for residents, students and other volunteers who want to see how a small composting setup can scale into a citywide habit.