Hidden cameras in Okanagan forests lead to more than a dozen garbage dumping fines

Members of the Okanagan Forest Task Force are using their own money to put cameras in the bush and have caught at least a dozen garbage dumpers on video over the last six weeks.

Task force spokesperson Kane Blake has said previous attempts to catch people dumping garbage on camera have failed as the cameras were often destroyed first.

“We’ve changed the ways we’re doing it,” is all he would say today, July 6, in terms of how and where the current batch of about half a dozen cameras are deployed.

And it’s not cheap.

One member just bought a $300 camera.

“I’m using my own personal hunting trail cam,” Blake said. “If it gets smashed, I’m out a trail cam.”

He’s tried to get cameras sponsored by, for example, the manufacturers, and while people think his efforts to haul garbage out of the bush are great, no one seems to want to help fund them.

In the last six weeks 13 or 14 tickets have been issued by conservation officers, Blake said. No word yet from the B.C. Conservation Officer Service on a dollar figure for those fines.

The Regional District of the Central Okanagan said on a web page dealing with illegal dumping fines can range from $100 to $2,000.

While the fines can be a lot more than what’s charged to haul garbage to the Glenmore Landfill in Kelowna, they don’t seem to have slowed the pace of illegal dumping, Blake said.

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