Hundreds of tires tossed in North City lot, cleanup to cost taxpayers
Drone 4 footage discovered hundreds more tires dumped
ST. LOUIS, Mo. (First Alert 4) - Hundreds of tires were mysteriously tossed in the Jeff-Vander-Lou(JVL) neighborhood over the weekend, leaving a St. Louis City Alderwoman frustrated.
Ward 11 Alderwoman Laura Keys says Saturday, she noticed 400-500 tires dumped in a lot off North Grand Avenue between Cozens and Cass Avenues.
“This cost taxpayers, your money,” said Keys. “A tire that has been cast out from somewhere onto our city streets, in our alleys on our roadways, this is out of control. This is definitely the work of people who are in the tire business.”
Drone 4 footage showed hundreds of more tires hidden behind the brush where the tires were dumped, Alderwoman Keys was shocked.
“Whoa! That is thousands of tires. We have a problem already right now with refuse not having enough people to take care of daily trash services,” said Alderwoman Keys. “So now, we’re going to pull those people off of their regular schedule to come and have to deal with this.”
First Alert 4 tracked down the lot’s owner to see if they’re aware of the tire dumping, but we didn’t get an answer.
Keys says this issue spans beyond the city. She says she recently has been in talks with some municipalities in North County who are experiencing the same issues.
Last September, Keys started tire amnesty day where three locations were established where people can drop off their old tires for free.
The next tire collection day is Saturday, September 28 with three locations in North City:
- N. Grand Blvd. and University St.
- N. Grand Blvd. and Carter Ave.
- Natural Bridge and Marcus Aves.
The Missouri Department of Natural Resources (DNR) says there are about 6 million scrap tires generated each year in the state. Since 1990, DNR says more than 17.6 million scrap tires from 1,386 scrap tire sites have been cleaned up, including properly disposing of all dumped tires. The department estimates there may be an additional 500,000 tires remaining in dump sites statewide that have not been discovered.
“I don’t see why they should be dumped,” said Chris Simpson, a long-time Jeff-Vander-Lou resident. “That’s taxpayer money, Alderwoman got to spend too much time being spent on some tires when we have other issues in our community.”
Alderwoman Keys hopes cameras catch the culprit in the act.
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