When it comes to the tidiness of her Wallis Avenue home in Farrell, Kim Baymon said the motive comes from an adage her grandfather told her growing up.

“Not only do people come in your house, but people pass by it all the time,” she recalled.

Mrs. Baymon and her husband Jeffrey were awarded the grand prize Saturday at the inaugural Properties of Merit reception in Valley Baptist Church, Farrell.

The banquet honored 15 families who set the precedent for keeping a neat exterior to their estates in some of Farrell and Sharon’s more impoverished neighborhoods.

“This is a positive thing for our community,” said Leon Harrison, the local team leader for the initiative he hopes “will shine a good light” on the exemplary homes and spur their neighbors to strive for the same.

“Our theme has always been pride to improvement,” Farrell Mayor Olive “Ollie” Brown-McKeithan said.

A chairman for the group, she said neighborhood improvements can become contagious and spread from block to block with enough effort.

Sharon Mayor Bob Lucas echoed Mrs. Brown-McKeithan’s call.

“Too many times we focus on the negative,” he said. “A neighborhood is only as good as the people in it.

“These are the exceptions. We want to make this a positive and the majority.”

The program’s initial year picked homes from five different sections of the two cities, honoring two in each along with a people’s choice winner.

“All these people have equally magnificent homes,” said Properties of Merit founder Siobhan “Sam” Bennett.

Ms. Bennett organized the program in 1989 in Oneonta, N.Y., before spreading it to Pennsylvania a few years later. It was recognized by Gov. Ed Rendell in 2006 and allotted money to grow statewide.

It’s a “proven fact” that a neighborhood where families take active roles in keeping their homes neat is much safer than their counterparts, Ms. Bennett said.

Spending “a few minutes” maintaining a property can help “transform” a section of a town for the better, she added.