Excessive Dumping of Large Items or Overfilling Dumpters

Started by EdwardD4 • 4 replies • 392 views

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EdwardD4 (California)
Posts: 99

Posted:

Need advice.

Every week we have excessive dumping in or around our trashcans. Our place looks like a landfill with appliances, toilets, rubbish, furniture etc, and we have to wait till the landscapers come to pick up the rubbish once a week. So if someone overfills or dumps “large” items around the trash can on Wed, we have to wait till the following Tues for the landscapers to haul it away. We have no cameras and it’s difficult to know when it happens which is almost daily, and the members got accustomed to it seeing the rubbish there weekly and probably do it themselves.

We also have a lot of renters moving in and out so that’s another problem. 3 days a week for approx 3-4 hours for each of the 3 days we pay for custodial services of around $22,000/yr which equates to about $$35-$47/hr. This lady cleans 4 areas where the dumpsters are located, 3 laundry rooms and a few areas around the complex. Some people would die for that job at that hourly rate.

Recommendations?

MelissaP1 (Alabama)
Posts: 13,836

Posted:

All you can do is try to enforce fines for dumping. Hope you catch the people who are. Every HOA/COA faces this issue. Not much you can do rather than find out who does it. After that make them pay for the additional expense for cleaning it up.

Former HOA President

JohnT38 (South Carolina)
Posts: 1,631

Posted:

It's time for some wireless cameras.

SheliaH (Indiana)
Posts: 6,964

Posted:

What John said.

This has been a problem in my community for years and on one point, we came this close to losing our contract with the trash company. In my area, HOAs have to enter into specific agreements with one of the two trash pickup companies serving the city. It's strange, but I guess this is what happens when politicians think major issues can be fixed by big business instead of "gubmint". The issue is more complicated than that, but people content to use the brain power."

We have a wireless camera aimed at out dumpster next to the clubhouse, as it's the most attractive for this mess - it's on a city street that goes through the community and people often dump in the middle of the night when everyone's sleeping or the middle of the day when people are at work or school. Even tgen, the board still had to send a flyer to everyone reminding them the city won't pick up illegal trash clothing up the dumpster and then the association has to pay to remove it. That's costing us $1500 a month.

I'd run the numbers and tell homeowners if this continues, the increased costs WILL be reflected in the assessments. You could also post signs saying the dumpsters are for resident use only, illegal dumping is prohibited, and violators will be prosecuted. And then do it. By prosecute, I mean fines to homeowners and their tenants and possibly filing cabinet complaints with the city (if your fines don't work, perhaps a nastygram from the city with a violation notice will do the trick).

If you get a camera, make sure it's as tamper proof as possible and can capture a large area - some people back up to the front of the dumpster shed so the camera doesn't capture the plates. That may mean you'll need to change the opening of the trash sheds to make that difficult

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it. Marcus Aurelius

LetA (Nevada)
Posts: 2,679

Posted:

Are you a condo building or a cluster of town home style buildings? If you are a cluster of TH's see if you can replace the dumpsters with individual trash bins.

One of the apartment accounts I cover recently gated off their dumpster corals. now you need a fob to get into the dumpster coral. This keeps out the vagrants and dumpster divers. They have surveillance
on property, so they can just see the time and date the dumpsters were accessed and look at the surveillance to find the culprit.

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