Pulaski County and state officials are drafting a plan to address illegal dumping in unincorporated areas after the recent certification of the county's first illegal-dumping control officer.
Stacy Edwards, inter-district waste tire coordinator for the Regional Recycling and Waste Reduction District in Pulaski County, was certified in October after several hours of training, joining 25 other such officers throughout Arkansas.
Edwards is now working with the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality, the prosecuting attorney's office and the sheriff's office to develop a program in Pulaski County to put some teeth into the fight against illegal dumping, she said.
"The cities all have their code-enforcement officers, and they do that really well," Edwards said. But for the unincorporated areas, the county doesn't have the resources, she said, and law enforcement officers don't have as much time to devote to stopping the dumping.
Often, people dump trash or tires in fields or burn their trash -- all of which is illegal, Edwards said. The district gets complaints about illegal dumping and questions about removing the waste, she said.
Officials investigate hundreds of illegal dumps each year across Arkansas. The Department of Environmental Quality listed 349 illegal-dumping complaints and inspections in 2014 and 364 in 2013. In Pulaski County, there were 51 in 2014 and 52 in 2013.
The state has 26 illegal-dumping control officers, mostly concentrated in the western part of the state.
In Benton, Washington, Sebastian and Johnson counties, there are a combined eight officers. Pulaski, Faulkner, Saline, White and Lonoke counties now each have one officer. Jefferson County has two.
Edwards said the dumps are an eyesore and a potential threat to public health.
Dump-control officers can't arrest people or carry guns, Edwards said, but they can cite people for dumping and even take them to court.
Edwards and others have said most people are "reasonable" and clean up the dumps after learning that what they were doing was illegal.
"A lot of people are uneducated about the law," said Michael Grappe, executive director of the Saline County Regional Solid Waste Management District, which started its own program to curb illegal dumps more than a year ago.
In many cases, people who burn their trash "were unaware that it was against federal law to burn," Grappe said.
Grappe and dump-control officer Shane Knight said the district has not cited anyone or taken anyone to court. Officers usually issue warnings in the several cases they investigate each month.
Knight said he's not sure whether the number of illegal dumps has decreased since he became an officer, but he believes the amount of reporting has increased, which he attributed to "increased awareness."
"A big part of this is going to be public education," Edwards said.
She said she hopes to present a plan for how she'll enforce the laws on illegal dumping at the district's March board meeting.
Metro on 01/26/2015