It’s Friday evening and Dublin litter warden Darren Hendrick is standing on the ramp of an industrial rubbish compactor. At his feet are three black bin bags, picked up during his rounds of the city centre that afternoon.
He is about to bash them open with a shovel, in the hope they contain something – an old bill, maybe an addressed envelope – that will lead him to the people who dumped them.
Litter wardens use this evidence to fine illegal dumpers, but Hendrick says lately that has gotten more difficult because they are wise to the tactics.
“People are a bit more canny,” he says. “They are careful not to put anything with their address on it in their rubbish.”
Hendrick, who is stationed at a council depot on Bow Lane in the south inner city, is one of about 20 litter wardens among a street-cleaning staff of more than 400 in the capital. The wardens make up “the front line of litter management in the city”, according to the council, and are responsible for enforcing the litter and waste management bye-laws.
His evening shift starts at 2pm when he checks his emails at the depot. If nothing requires urgent attention, he will head out on his rounds. Today he says he will start by looking at a few bags he spotted on George’s Street on his way to work.
Particular issues, such as dumped domestic waste or dog fouling, affect different areas of the city. In the commercial centre, businesses leaving bags out at the wrong time is one of the main problems. The businesses may not have intended to dump it illegally, per se, but probably put it out after the private collector passed. Either way, all waste must be off the street between 10am and 5pm, otherwise it can earn its owners a fine.
On George’s Street, Hendrick snaps on a pair of blue latex gloves and starts rooting around in the bags. He finds a couple of receipts from a nearby restaurant and goes in for a word. After an amicable exchange, the manager agrees to take the rubbish in. Hendrick, a mild mannered and friendly 46-year-old, could issue a fine but he says it is often better to simply talk to people. “It felt like he was taking on board what I was saying,” he says. “So hopefully I won’t have any more problems there.”
Grand Canal
The Bow Lane Depot serves an area stretching from the south bank of the Liffey, across to the Grand Canal Dock, and along the Grand Canal itself as far as Portobello Bridge and then back in the George’s Street direction.
On Anne’s Lane, near Grafton Street, Hendrick spots a pair of advertising signs for a local business which have been placed over two street bollards. “This is another thing,” he says. “Signs on public structures: that’s not allowed. I’ll have to go in and talk to him.”
The owner tells Hendrick the signs have been there for four years and that someone told him they were okay before. “Well,” replies Hendrick. “I’m telling you now you’ll have to get rid of them – otherwise it’s a €150 fine.”
Walking away from the shop he privately admits tying a sign to a bollard was “only a small thing” in the grand scheme of things. “But if I let one person away with it, then everyone will do it.”
At College Green he stops again. A pile of rubbish stuffed into a cardboard box has been left beside a wheelie bin at one of the makeshift pedestrian crossings put in place during the Luas Cross City works. The gloves go on; Hendrick finds an address and walks into a nearby shop.
“Are we getting fined?” asks the manager behind the counter. No, says Hendrick, as long as someone takes it in. A minute later, a member of staff is out in the rain, staring down at the box which, by now, passersby have started using as a litter bin. “I have to clean this up now?” she sighs. “Great.”
At 3.45pm, Hendrick, no longer on foot but driving a small Transit Connect van from the depot, picks up a black bag on Fleet Street in Temple Bar. It has no tags, meaning someone clearly dumped it. He throws it in the back so he can look through it later.
He then steers on to Wellington Quay where he spots another refuse sack plopped on the footpath near the Ha’penny Bridge. He nudges it with his foot. “It’s too heavy,” he says, the company refused to collect it.
Power hosing
“It’s probably food,” he adds, pulling out his mobile phone and calling for a council truck to come around. He could try lifting it into the Transit, he says, but if it rips, he will spend the rest of the day power hosing the back of the van.
A few minutes later the bag is on the back of the truck and Hendrick is free to search its contents which, for the most part, consist of half-eaten fish and chips meals and smushed butter pats.
“You get used to it,” he says, knuckles deep in the remains of someone’s battered cod. “It’s part of the job, unfortunately.” He fails to locate anything to indicate the load’s provenance, so a few minutes later we’re back on the road.
Heading east now, Hendrick stops briefly in the Wax Museum to tell them to stop handing out flyers on public streets. At 4.40pm, he swings on to Pearse Square, off Pearse Street, which he says has been the source of a few complaints. And sure enough, today someone has thrown two black bags on the footpath – a “classic case”. He photographs the bags and then produces a black notebook. “You never know what you could be asked about in court,” he explains. “So you take down as many details as you can.”
In 2014, the council issued 2,290 fines. Of these, 698 were paid but the city had to prosecute 542 cases and of these just 44 were successful.
Hendrick finds himself in court about once a month on average. People get a certain amount of time to pay a fine. If they continue to refuse to pay they can end up in front of a judge. “You get a lot of people who don’t even turn up,” says Hendrick. “You have to go chasing them.”
Fly tipping
Later, in a small residential enclave at Wilson’s Place, he pulls up and gestures towards the footpath. “That’s what you call fly tipping,” he says, pointing towards a kitchen counter, a table top and two big bags that someone has dumped directly under a Dublin City Council “No Dumping” sign.
“There’s no way of knowing who put that there,” he continues, explaining that CCTV is restricted in residential areas. “I’ll just have to get the lads to come down and take it away.”
After this it is back to the depot to sift through the three bags he has picked up. The first one contains mostly kitchen waste. Hendrick shakes his head as he flicks away an avocado skin. “I’d say the chances of me getting anything out of this are pretty slim.” He moves on to the second bag, which has chicken bones and empty cat food packets but, again, no evidence. Finally, he opens the third bag. “Cat litter,” he groans, before dumping the lot in the compactor.
The dumpers got away with it today. “You mightn’t get them one day but another day you would. It could be somebody who’s dumping all the time and just one day, maybe their kid will throw a letter or an old bill in the bag. People know I think at this stage that that’s how we get our evidence. But they’ll slip up at some stage.”
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