Renewed focus puts spotlight on illegal dumping
A couch on the side of the road, an old refrigerator tossed in a vacant lot, trash piled up at a highway exit — these are all common sights for many Bakersfield residents.
But a new focus from the city of Bakersfield and county of Kern, along with an influx of cash from the Public Safety and Vital Services Measure that went before voters as Measure N, could soon change that.
Just this week, the Bakersfield City Council and Kern County Board of Supervisors passed measures designed to curb illegal dumping and littering. City and county leaders expect the votes to be just the tip of the iceberg as the governing bodies reconvene in 2021.
“A lot of us are fed up, and we’re sick and tired of seeing trash on the street, and bulky waste all over,” said Councilman Andrae Gonzales. “And frankly this was a piece of Measure N that we campaigned on, that we would work on beautification, that we would work on enhancing the quality of life for our city. And that means cleaner neighborhoods and cleaner thoroughfares, and the gateways to our city ought to look really nice.”
According to Lisa Shreder, a Kern County Public Works manager, illegal dumping has gotten steadily worse over time. So far this year, she said the department had cleaned up around 1.4 million pounds of improperly discarded material.
On Tuesday, supervisors amended several county ordinances to allow park rangers and Public Works officials the ability to administer a citation of at least $1,000 for illegal dumping violations. Previously, the penalty involved charging violators with a misdemeanor, which entailed them showing up in court and paying associated fees.
While illegal dumping could still land someone a misdemeanor, the county says
the administrative citation streamlines what had been a costly and intrusive process.
“Nearly 100% of the administrative penalties paid by those issued citations will be collected and kept by the county specifically to help pay for and prevent illegal dumping activity,” Kern County Chief Administrative Officer Ryan Alsop wrote in an email to The Californian. “It’s simply an additional tool in our effort to fight this egregious, illegal activity.”
On Wednesday, the Bakersfield City Council approved a $588,720 contract with California Highway Adoption for two teams that will respond to “hot spots” throughout the city for litter abatement.
The contract is a part of Bakersfield’s new Clean City Initiative, which utilizes Measure N dollars for quality of life purposes. Without the 1 percent sales tax increase, Bakersfield City Manager Christian Clegg said the new cleanup efforts wouldn’t be possible.
“Now that we’ve made a big push on public safety, made a big push on homelessness, the next big push is on quality of life and economic development,” he said of the city’s tax measure. “Many of the visible, tangible results of Measure N are yet to be seen because we had to develop the programs, deploy the funding. And I think people are going to see a lot more of those benefits in the near future. Even that first year’s influx of funding, we’re just starting to see those benefits come, but the proof is in the pudding.”