City Looking At Ways To Crackdown On Illegal Dumping
Amount of refuse collected by Solid Waste Services staff chart courtesy CPG
Prince George, BC – Illegal dumping has become the single largest operational challenge facing the City’s Solid Waste Services Division.
In a report that will go before City Council tomorrow night, Parks and Solid Waste Manager, Sean LeBrun, says there’s been a steady increase in the amount of illegal dumping within the greater Prince George region since 2011.
LeBrun says there are a number of sites – Hoferkamp Road atop the cutbanks and Blueberry Road behind the Hart scales being just two examples – where barricades and gates have been installed to try and keep illegal dumping to a minimum.
“Due to the types and sizes of materials being dumped, clean-up of these sites often requires heavy equipment and large trucks.” LeBrun notes clean-up and removal of the debris is labour intensive, time consuming and often expensive.
He says City staff have been working with the Regional District of Fraser Fort George to assess the full extent of the problem and develop a strategy to mitigate illegal dumping that will include: mapping of sites, organized clean-ups, improved reporting and bylaw enforcement.
LeBrun says SWS staff are also studying whether to end the collection of commercial waste. In his report to Council, he writes, “This twice per week manual service of 205 accounts is time consuming, a workplace injury concern for staff, and a service that could be provided by one of the private sector waste haulers.” If stopped, LeBrun estimates 14-hours of staff time could be re-directed to other priorities, like illegal dumping.
Comments
Illegal dumping will continue to be a problem as long as we continue to charge for taking garbage to the dump.
Every time the Regional District raises rates, they notice that solid waste deliveries to the dump, drop. They pat themselves on the back. What a great idea they had… Look how much they collected in tipping fees and look how much people lowered their garbage production in the area.
Except that maybe it wasn’t such a great idea… Maybe the amount of garbage the Prince George area produces didn’t actually decrease. Maybe it was just diverted to back roads.
If we want the garbage to go to the dump and not back roads, lower the tipping fees and increase the property taxes to compensate.
Congratulations to PGguy1234, who over 3 years ago predicted increasing landfill dumping fees would result in increased illegal dumping. Oringinal posted comment follows”
Posted on Thursday, February 28, 2013 @ 7:23 PM by PGguy1234 with a score of 0
For 6 bucks how much of this stuff will end up in the ditch instead of the landfill
50% 50%
What we have is a policy of deviation activation so as to justify other policy objectives, all the while ignoring the real concerns of other stakeholders.
They set policy that created a problem. Namely charging a fee to dump and closing dumping stations… leading to dumping in rural areas. Now that the deviation activation has been enabled we hear of new penalties, the gating up of back roads, and further restrictions and clamp downs to solve the problem originally created. Ideas that would meet much more opposition if not for the problem originally created to smooth over a more totalitarian response.
Window …I agree..just to go to the landfill for debris costs dollars..lower the fees and the illegal dumping will stop.
Bring back the swap shed as well.
You talk about going green and recycle, yet you closed down the swap shed.
6 bucks for 100 kilograms of garbage is dirt cheap. People are just lazy, that’s all. People spend more then that on cigarettes or Tims daily.
Are these same people protesting the rise in utility costs by peeing on the steps of city hall?
A couple of trail cams followed by a public shaming campaign should work.
I agree as long as people have to pay to dump garbage dumping will continue on side road and so on. I have lived in Prince George since 1978 and did not to pay to dump by garbage at the dump until some genuine at the city hall came up with let’s make they pay for taking there garbage to the dump. Great idea genuine you created another problem. I say give the residents bigger garbage containers for the lower price and have the city pick up big items 3 to 4 times a year from residents. Like once in April, August and November. This might solve the problem. BRING BACK THE SWAP SHED.
Never had to use the dump and when we did we thought we were going to have to pay erroneous prices to dump renovation waste. When we showed up with a large dump trailer full of heavy waste we were shocked to find it only cost us 30 dollars.
The prices really aren’t that high, there are also so many many places that except various items for recycling that there is less to dump.
I agree with axeman, people are just lazy. Do some research and ask where things can be dumped or recycled.
I think a solution would be to some how charge up front when purchasing items like appliances and roofing material, then making it free to dump those items. I have helped pick garbage off the highways for fundraisers and there is roofing material everywhere. I agree with the game camera idea, catch some people and levy stiff fines, perhaps that will deter some people.
The fees are expensive if you are just dropping off a bag of garbage. Before they charged I used to drop off our garbage at the transfer stations just about all the time in the summer, just swing by a couple times a week. That way we never had to worry about bears. Just putting the garbage in a shed won’t stop the bears and they can do a lot of damage getting in. I won’t pay $12/week to drop off my garbage and pay for garbage pick up as well.
I say bring back the swap shed. It appears to me that they do not want their employees to take some time to clean up around it at the end of the day. Many reusable item’s are being thrown in the garbage that can be used by many people. Not everyone can buy new all the time. It goes by weight and a small load of fence posts will cost you $50 . A fridge and a deep freeze $20 each. We pay Eco fee when buying a deep freeze so where are you supposed to take this at no cost to discard? Until they change policy fridges,stoves etc will end up in the bush.
The swap shed at the landfill was an absolute zoo, people were getting into fist fights over stuff. Once, I had a person rip stuff out of my arms as I carried it over to the shed.
Yup, the very last time I used the shed there was an altercation over what I was dropping off.
The transfer station and sani dump sit idle on 18th Ave and Quinn St. This is a total waste of money. The City taxed us, and built this station so that we could dump our garbage there. They then closed it down for dubious reasons that still do not make any sense. Some horse s..t about saving money by having the Regional District look after it. I would suggest that they do not want a sani dump, and transfer station with the attendant smells, etc; adjacent to their new office buildings, or the wanted the property for some other reason. It will only be a matter of time until they tear up all the concrete and put in more parking for City employee’s.
Whats the chances of Bylaw enforcement doing anything about this issue.
Bring back the transfer station, and the swap shed. Give us back what we paid for. Quit screwing us around.
axman–One incident out of 500 maybe. Any time that I was there,never was a problem. If you feared for your safety around the swap shed you had the option and could have thrown it in the garbage bin but it appears to me you had a valuable enough item that someone could use and that is why the swap shed is needed.
I respectfully disagree. We only went there a few times, but it was pretty intimidating having people fight over what was in our truck, before the truck was even stopped. There were people that just hung out there all day, fighting with each other about the stuff. Maybe they should have implemented a 1/2 hour limit for time spent there. Would certainly cut down on the fighting.
To hear the district and witnesses tell it, it was much more then a 1 in 500 incident.
I think I was dropping an old lamp off. Nothing fancy but from what I gather, the person who grabbed it used to hold a garage sale weekly to sell stuff from the swap shed.
The most amusing part about this announcement is another organization that is trying to reduce costs by reducing the thing that they get paid for. I am thinking very much like school districts closing schools. It is their business to teach, yet a cost saving measure is to eliminate teaching positions. Duh!
This is very similar, waste management is in the business of handling, well, solid waste. Their cost saving is to handle less solid waste. Duh!
Sounds kind of stupid when it is said out loud.
Of course, no one said you needed a brain to be bureaucrat.
axman–You have to give the guy credit for trying to make an honest buck and besides it was a gift from you. This is much better than having someone have to steal things to make a living. Really who cares if he sold it at a garage sale.
That he held a weekly garage sale isn’t really the issue. It’s the getting into fist fights and harassing the public just to get those items that is at issue.
Canadian Pickers – American Pickers – Prince George Pickers.
And Toe pickers…PG pickers=dumpster divers….
We could locate commercial garbage containers on the corners of residential blocks, and have them picked up weekly by commercial operators. If we do that then we can take our garbage to the containers once a week, and eliminate any need for the City being involved in garbage disposal.
Using this system we could save millions of dollars and have a more efficient, system.
No point in the City having a Waste Management System, if they cannot manage waste.
The first one can go right beside your house so you can deal with the traffic, stench and ravens spreading garbage everywhere.
Love that idea, Palopu, best I’ve heard yet. Only down side I can react with is that inevitably there will be a pile beside the dumpsters left by the same deep thinkers that are dumping illegally now.
I was going to suggest something a little more far out;
ELIMINATE tipping fees of $6.00/100 kg.
PAY $6.00 for each large/heavy item delivered to the dump.
REASONING: an incentive to do the right thing, for those who would rather dump surreptitiously to save 6 + dollars.
I know that when I was young and between jobs, we used to travel the bush roads looking for scrap like batteries and radiators from wrecked cars, even heavier pieces if we could load them. We would trade these things at Allen’s Scrap for gas money. He used to sell that re-refined oil there too, real cheap lube for oil burning jalopies. Doing the same today, I would add the items I could ‘sell’ at the dump, and maybe have enough for gas AND cigarettes;)
Any recyclable materials delivered to the dump would be and are being sold for scrap value, this scheme would increase that volume.
There would still be a net loss in revenue for solid waste management but how much does it cost for the City to pick up illegal dumps?
I mean true cost, from the time they find it, organize it, transport labour and machinery, operating costs, cost to erect more steel gates and fences, time lost to other jobs they could be doing instead, like road repair and maintenance, it really adds up for every clean up.
From the wild idea dept,
metalman.
this will also mean getting bylaws officers out and about, not just out by the coffee pot or only working weekdays.
and only until 4:30.
I don’t give a hoot if they kill each other at the dump, just don’t dump their crap on my road. This is exactly what happened about 2 weeks ago. I saw the truck go flying past the house when they left. IF I had caught you… I will give you something to think about. goddam pigs!!!
If stopped, LeBrun estimates 14-hours of staff time could be re-directed to other priorities, like illegal dumping
Well we can all save you some time if you want. The next time we have an old fridge or stove we can dump it off in the parking lot at City Hall and it will save you many man hrs. not having to look for the items in the bush. If you haven’t figured it out by now the thing that it is telling me is that your fees are too high or should not be there at all. Another thing people are not just lazy–it’s about affordability.
The commercial containers would be set out early on the morning of the day the containers would be collected. You would have to have your garbage in the container by noon on collection day. This is not much different than what you do now, except you would have to walk a little further to throw your garbage in the dumpster. This process would eliminate garage containers all over the City, eliminate problems with bears, garbage pick up days would remain the same, and the containers would be out of the neighborhood by 5pm on garbage day.(More or less).
Any large items that are presently being taken to the land fill (or not) could be dropped off at the Quinn street transfer centre, and sorted and taken to the landfill by the contractor.
The savings by eliminating the City Waste Management Department, would be more than sufficient to off set the cost of private business looking after garbage.
Keep in mind that the City already supports private pick up of garbage from commercial enterprises, and in fact in the article suggests that it should be expanded, they just didn’t go far enough with the privatizing idea.
Part of the contract would be for the contracter to keep the area where the container is positioned clean.
Palopu- On the funny side everyone has a plan or an idea and I don’t know why I did not think of this sooner. I am going to purchase myself a Drone. That way I can drop off my garbage after hrs. and there will be no fees to worry about. Just drop it in the bin and while I am there I can check out the swap shed.
Oldman 1. I think most of the drone’s will be busy with cross border smuggling, and residential drug deliveries.
I think it’s about time for the powers to be to go on a trip to another city and see how they handle this problem. Obviously they need some help.
Or isn’t it about time for another China excursion (tongue in cheek)
Illegal dumping on private sites has gone off the deep end as well, especially the last week of each month (moving day). Those bins behind businesses and malls are paid for by the business and not the city (eagleone)
Even the dumpster divers on bikes, when they don’t make a mess they are stealing the wheels off the bin doors – yes we have you on camera. Didn’t realize they pack much more than lock cutters on these bicycles until you look at the surveillance footage, they come prepared
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