Anyone can contribute to the map of sites where tires, construction debris and other junk is dumped illegally.

A few dozen people crowded around paper maps of Philadelphia neighborhoods at the Discovery Center in Fairmount Park on Thursday. They placed stickers on the maps at places near their homes where people frequently dump tires, old furniture, mattresses and bags of trash.

“You clean it, you go back and it’s there again,” said Majeedah Rashid, chief operating officer of the Nicetown Community Development Corporation.

The anti-dumping advocacy group Trash Academy hosted Thursday’s mapping event to gather data for its crowdsourced online map of persistent illegal dump sites in Philadelphia.

Members hope the map will help them raise awareness of illegal dumping, advocate for more funding, push for policy solutions and track progress toward the group’s goal of eliminating these sites in the city by 2028.

“When we’re going to these elected officials and others, and even educating the community, we [will] have data,” said Rashid, who’s also a member of Trash Academy. “The data tells the story.”

Aminata Sandra Calhoun, director of sanitation and environmental programs at Centennial Parkside Community Development Corporation, placed two stickers on the map of her neighborhood at Thursday’s event. She said the illegal dump sites on Girard Avenue and 47th Street have attracted old tires, toilets, mattresses, mobility aids and loads of trash bags.

“It is a definite, definite hemorrhoidal eyesore,” she said.

Anyone can submit dump sites to add to the map. Users can upload photos and share descriptions of the dumping and their experiences.

Patricia Ford, a block captain in the Nicetown neighborhood and a member of Trash Academy, said the discarded bags of trash in her neighborhood attract pests. Children have to walk past debris like toilets, old furniture and construction waste on their way to school, she said.

“Once it’s cleaned up, within 24 hours, it’s back there again,” Ford said.

Ford hopes the crowdsourced map helps make the case for more city funding for enforcement of illegal dumping laws, as well as other solutions such as curbside pickup of compost and an expansion of a voucher program piloted by the nonprofit North10 that helps people who cannot afford to dispose of construction and demolition waste legally.

“The mapping project is to show the city exactly where these dump sites are,” Ford said. “I don’t want to say the city is totally ignoring it, but the city is not paying as much attention as it should.”

Source: WHYY