By JESSE GRAHAM
IF YOU go out in the woods today, you’re sure of a big surprise – perhaps even two truckloads worth of it.
Thousands of taxpayers’ dollars were spent collecting rubbish on Friday 11 September, after two truckloads of it was dumped down an embankment.
The Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) spent $3000 hiring five contractors to abseil off of the side of Old Warburton Road in Wesburn and collect rubbish.
A mattress, a couch and about 30 tyres – including a large, tractor-size tyre – were all dumped down the embankment recently, according to DELWP forest and fire officer Joy Harte.
Ms Harte said DELWP officers were not trained to abseil down the steep hillside, with a gradient of roughly 45 degrees, meaning that taxpayer money had to be spent on hiring contractors to do the work.
One of these contractors, Duncan Hughes-Gage, said it would take the five staff members 10 hours to haul up all of the rubbish, which was scattered down the hill and into the Yankee Jims Creek.
Ms Harte said the dumping was the latest in a “spate” of rubbish dumping in the Yarra State Forest, and that DELWP officers had been running a blitz to clean as much up as possible.
“We’ve had a spate of rubbish dumping … and it’s got considerably worse,” she said.
“We’ve had a blitz right across the forest – we’ve recently picked up 10 lots of asbestos, and we had to get an asbestos contractor out, which cost $8000.”
She said much of the dumping appeared to be carried out by small business contactors, who dump waste rather than paying tip fees, along with families moving house.
Another concern was hunters dumping animal carcasses in the forest – some of which had been found near the waterways by the abseiling contractors.
“We’ve discovered, this morning, some carcasses – deer and other animals that are down there as well, which you would not want near the watercourse,” Ms Harte said.
“We’re really disappointed that people are coming to areas like this, beautiful areas, where they’re just putting rubbish over this embankment.”
In the 100 metres to the left and right of the area being cleaned by the contractors, the Mail and DELWP representatives saw other dumped material, including deck chairs and a vehicle engine.
The site of the dumping was little more than one kilometre along the road from the Wesburn Waste Transfer Station.
The Mail asked Ms Harte whether tip prices, frequently cited by residents as being too expensive, were a factor in the increase of dumping.
“Well, definitely,” she said.
“Obviously, that’s one of the reasons why we’ve had an increase in rubbish dumping.
“The Shire (Yarra Ranges Council) has contracted that out independently, so it’s not a shire problem – (but) people just won’t pay the price.”
But the price careless dumpers pay could be heftier prices than those at the tip – Ms Harte said every piece of rubbish collected would be investigated, and anyone identified could expect to be prosecuted.
In a July DELWP release, Ms Harte said littering and dumping in the forest carried a fine of $303 on-the-spot, and dumpers could then be prosecuted under the Environmental Protection Act for a maximum penalty of $6066.
Dumping asbestos also carried fines of “thousands of dollars”, she said.
She urged anyone who witnesses any suspicious behaviour to contact the DELWP Powelltown office on 5965 9901, and for residents to use the tip when having a spring clean-out.
The Yarra Ranges Council, in a recent officer’s report on the Healesville Waste Transfer Station, cited higher tip fees as a result of the EPA’s Landfill Levy.
