$25,000 for the birds

Alabama Power's Sam Covert, division area manager, presented Linda Vice, regional tourism director, with a $25,000 check from the Alabama Power Foundation to help develop the Southwest Alabama Birding Trail last week. Looking on are local Alabama Power managers Judy Graham, left, and Danny D'Andrea, right.

Plans for a Southwest Alabama Birding Trail got a big boost with a $25,000 surprise donation from the Alabama Power Foundation last Thursday.

Division Area Manager Sam Covert and local managers Judy Graham and Danny D'Andrea presented the check to Linda Vice, Alabama-Tombigbee Regional Commission tourism director at the Clarke County Development Foundation's breakfast meeting in Grove Hill.

The seed money will help to complete an "eco-tourism" initiative birding trail in this area, part of a statewide network. The northern portion of the trail is complete as is a coastal trail in Baldwin and Mobile counties. The Black Belt Birding and Heritage Trail is nearing completion.

Birding is a big tourism business. There are 48 million bird watchers in the United States and about 18 percent of Alabama's citizens consider themselves birders.

Alabama's tourism industry took in $8.9 billion in the last fiscal year and the completion of statewide trails is considered a strategic element of this year's focus on "Outdoor Alabama."

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