A COALS Cleanup was held at the Center Street, Hughestown Borough site in Luzerne County. This site, a property of Hughestown Borough, has been a site of illegal dumping for many years and an eyesore in the community. Due to the amount of trash and the steep terrain of the site, it was necessary to retain a contractor, Gary Fronk Inc., to remove the illegally dumped material. A total of 12 tons of trash was removed from this site. A significant amount of wood was removed and will be used for a controlled training burn by the Hughestown Hose Company.
"I applaud the COALS program for responding to the obvious need to remove an unfortunate stain from the Hughestown landscape. I'm hopeful every citizen will demonstrate appropriate respect for our environment thereby preventing future illegal dumping." stated State Representative Mike Carroll.
Funding for the COALS program has been provided by Earth Conservancy, Mericle Real Commercial Real Estate Services, Pennsylvania American Water Company Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, and United States Department of Agriculture.
J.P. Mascaro and Sons, a COALS Program sponsor, donated the dumpsters and the cost to transport the waste to the landfill. Keystone Sanitary Landfill, another COALS Program sponsor donated disposal costs for the trash.
COALS is a program to remove illegally dumped garbage and trash through a partnership among environmental groups, business and industry, including coal and waste companies, and local, county and state governments.
In 2008, PEC coordinated the cleanup of 34 sites resulting in the removal of 202 tons of municipal waste, 76 tons of tires and 22 tons of scrap metals. Over 20 cleanups are planned for 2009. Much work remains - on average, there are over 200 illegal dumpsites in each County in the Commonwealth.