Residents of Dublin’s dirtiest district, who have failed to sign up for refuse collections, face a Dublin City Council waste enforcement crackdown in coming weeks.
The council will be calling to homes in the north east inner city where they know the residents who have not registered for bin or bag collections, using information provided by waste firms.
Where the occupants cannot prove to the council’s satisfaction that they are disposing of their household rubbish in a legal manner, they can be fined €75 on the spot, increasing to €2,500 if the council takes a court prosecution.
The north inner city is repeatedly ranked by Irish Business Against Litter (Ibal) as the dirtiest urban area in the State.
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The anti-litter lobby group works with An Taisce to survey cleanliness levels in 40 urban areas around the State. Its final survey for last year put Dublin’s north inner city at the bottom of the league table, with several streets in the north east inner city branded as litter black spots due to the proliferation of illegally dumped refuse sacks.
Since 2013 households have been required to register with approved waste collection firms or be able to prove, using receipts, that they are taking their rubbish to an authorised waste facility.
Dublin City Council 10 years ago initiated an enforcement campaign calling to 4,700 homes on 160 streets in the north east inner city to determine if residents were paying to have their rubbish collected. However, the initiative was time consuming and labour intensive with limited success in encouraging compliance with waste regulations.
New legislation has enabled the council to compile a “reverse register” to establish who does and does not have a waste collection contract, to allow it to specifically target non-compliant households.
“Waste collectors are obliged to keep a record of who has a waste collection contract by Eircode, and they are obliged to give that information to the local authority,” the council’s head of waste management Barry Woods said.
“We can then mine that data and drill through that data to see who doesn’t have a waste collection contract. We can then follow that up with cold calling at properties, and then we can prosecute,” he said.
“The area that we have identified to roll out that project is the north east inner city and that will be happening in the next few weeks.”
While many streets in the area had a derogation allowing them to use bags instead of wheely bins, they must still prove they are buying bags and “disposing of their waste properly” he said.
“If they cannot produce that receipt for purchasing tagged bags, then we can prosecute, so that is a project we are rolling out in the north east inner city to combat illegal dumping that’s there.”
CCTV cameras to identify illegal dumpers are also due to be operational in the area shortly.
