COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

South Dublin County Council Crest

MEETING OF SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

Monday, May 09, 2022

QUESTION NO. 25

QUESTION: Councillor F. Timmons

To ask the Chief Executive how the issue of Litter can be addressed within our county, how he intends to address it, and the cost of both to SDCC?

REPLY:

The South Dublin County Council Litter Mangement Plan 2020-2022 proposes to address the negative impacts of litter on our county, improve the quality of life and sense of wellbeing of our residents, and enhance our commercial and tourism potential through effective and efficient enforcement of legislation and regulation, management and maintenance of our public realm and communication, education and awareness. The Litter Management Plan includes annual action plans. Progress on the annual action plans is reported twice yearly to each Area Committee. A full report was presented to members at the February Area Committee Meetings.

Initiatives ongoing include but are not limited to the following:

Improvements have been achieved which have been reflected in IBAL and Tidy Towns reports, and once again the Council is very appreciative of the community and voluntary efforts that are made alongside the Council’s work to bring about these positive changes.

All incidents of litter and illegal dumping reported or detected in any area are investigated by the Council's Litter Warden Service and all dumped material is searched for evidence. Where evidence is found, the appropriate enforcement action is taken under the Litter Pollution Act 1997, as amended. Increasingly, it is found that no personal information relating to polluters is contained within the dumped material, with personal information having been removed or shredded. 392 Litter Fines were issued in 2021; 117 fines have been issued up to the end of March 2022.

To date in 2022 12 cases have been heard in Court; 5 of which were successful. Currently, there are an additional 30 cases awaiting hearing.

As part of the Council's commitment to deliver on the objectives of the Corporate Plan and Litter Management Plan, there is an increased targeted focus on known litter generator areas; a number of structured routes have been identified for continuous patrol, as well as ad hoc patrols and investigations as required.

As always, the Council is grateful for assistance and support from local residents or others in their investigations of such incidents as they arise. In the absence of substantive evidence / witness statements and the presence of such witnesses in court it is not possible for us to bring successful prosecutions.

A revenue expenditure budget of €1,811,500 is provided in 2022 for Litter Management, which includes Litter Warden and Environmental Awareness Services.

The following cleansing services are provided by the Public Realm Section.  A total of €8.1m has been provided in the annual budget 2022 against the provision of these services  -