A LEGISLATIVE COMMEMORATION, Commending and congratulating Bridger Gordon, age twelve, of Whitewood on achieving national recognition for exemplary volunteer service by receiving a 2013 Prudential Spirit of Community Award.

    WHEREAS, Bridger was first inspired to live every day as if it were Earth Day, when as an eight-year-old, he noticed litter in public places. He started to pick up litter during family walks and soon began to encourage his classmates to follow suit. Bridger then coordinated several community clean-up events with his 4-H club; and

    WHEREAS, over the past three years, Bridger has organized community rummage sales, collected worn-out tennis shoes, initiated recycling programs at his school and the county fair, and created a "green" Facebook page, all with the goal of inspiring others to reduce the amount of waste being sent to landfills; and

    WHEREAS, from more than twenty-eight thousand participants, Bridger was named a local honoree. Bridger was then chosen as one of two state honorees for South Dakota and one of one hundred two honorees in the nation. In May, Bridger will travel to Washington, D.C., for a series of national recognition events. While in Washington, D.C., Bridger will tour the Capital's landmarks, meet his fellow top youth volunteers from other parts of the world, attend a gala awards ceremony at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, and visit his Congressional representatives on Capitol Hill. Bridger will also be considered by the National Selection Committee to be named one of ten National Honorees:

    NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT COMMEMORATED, by the Eighty-Eighth Legislature of the State

of South Dakota, that Bridger Gordon be recognized for having achieved the distinction of State Honoree in the 18^th Annual Prudential Spirit of Community Awards.