It is so vital that our city  project an image of a clean and "green" place to live, work, and visit. There has has been plenty of postive focus in the last few years on Pittsburgh. Our local economy is on the rebound, we've had the Steeler and Penguins championships, the G-20 Summit, and the United Nations brought the 2010 World Enviroment Day to our city... Pittsburgh is constantly making positive news.      
      Our goal is to help Pittsburgh restore it's communities and transform neglected areas back into places to be proud of. Our main objective is  cleaning-up illegal dumpsites and preventing them from happening again. There are almost 300 illegal dumpsites on public land in the city. Our focus for the next 5 years will be on the "East End" of Pittsburgh.
        We can go beyond the traditional volunteer and donation process, and reach out additionally to corporate sponsors and other communty businesses for faster, better results. In the age of the internet... we are poised with a new avenue for recruiting young volunteers (facebook/myspace), and a broad base of enthusiastic thinkers. This truly is the time for change!!!


     

PA CleanWays has been dedicated to empowering people to eliminate illegal dumping since 1990. In 2009, they completed a survey that calculated atleast  279 illegal dumpsites in the City of Pittsburgh. This survey only includes dumpsites that were able to be seen from public roads and areas... and it is thus, safe to assume that the number of dumpsites on private grounds could almost double this number.
One of our organizations long term goals, is to bring the number of dumpsites in the city to under 200 within 5 years. This will mean eliminating atleast 80 sites in 5 years, a huge undertaking. We will need tremendous public support, and you can find out more ways to help by clicking on the link that says "donate/volunteer" at the top of this page.

Also, if you would like to view the PA Cleanways 2009 Illegal Dumpsite Survey and its 279 locations, you can do so by clicking or copying and pasting the link below:
http://www.pacleanways.org/IDS/surveys/MASTER_cityofpittsburghIDS.pdf

Important Information regarding how Illegal Dumpsites can impact you and your community:

     Illegal dumping poses a direct threat the health and the safety of humans and animals alike. Illegal dumping grounds can not only be a source of potential physical injury (rust, glass, toxic substances)... but they also become disease filled breeding grounds for rodents and insects. Mosquitos carrying the West Nile Virus have been a major concern in recent years regarding dumping sites as well.
     Illegal dumpsites become environmental disasters over time... polluting our soil, groundwater, and even the air we breathe.
     Our communities also can see property values impacted as well as added liabilities for property owners. Tourism and city-population can see negative impacts as well, because people from out of town, and current residents, can develop a perception that trash and dumping is not a priority to our communties.
      Whatever the reason... Dumpsites impact our quality of life more than we realize.