More cameras are coming to North Texas— specifically, Fort Worth— and they’re headed to a spot you’ve likely never seen, but one illegal dumpers know far too well.
Tony Gutierrez, an environmental investigator for the city, walked along a partially paved road Tuesday, surrounded by thick woods with little to indicate it’s within Fort Worth city limits.
Gutierrez says he’s spent countless hours along Greenbelt Road cleaning up what others illegally leave behind.
“Just a lot of trash and debris,” Gutierrez said. “Furniture — we get it all here.”
And that cleanup comes at a cost. Over the past two years, taxpayers have spent about $85,000 on illegal dumping cleanup. That figure, Gutierrez noted, doesn’t include the cost of investigations or prosecutions.
“We have to travel sometimes out of the city — to Arlington, Dallas, even — to try and track the violators down,” he said.
To curb the problem and cut costs, the Fort Worth City Council approved the purchase of solar-powered cameras. The cameras are designed for remote areas with no electricity access — like wooded dumping hotspots.
It’s the same type of security system often seen in retail parking lots across North Texas, now repurposed for a more secluded setting.
Fort Worth will invest about $126,000 over two years to install the cameras where illegal dumping is most common.
Gutierrez said a pilot project earlier this year showed promising results.
“It affected people coming in here. They would see the cameras, they would hear the announcement and they would turn around and leave,” he said.