The Illinois EPA is helping the Metro East village ofWashington Park clean up an illegal dumping site this week.
The area an estimated 100 tons of trash, and the clean-up is expected to take three to five days.
Illinois EPA spokeswoman Maggie Carson says they found the illegal dump during a reconnaissance fly-over with theIllinois Army National Guard.
"It is something we've done a little bit of recently and found it to be very effective," Carson says, "Obviously, you can see better from that perspective especially this time of year when the leaves are off the trees."
Carson also says those costs come out of an enforcement agreement with the Allied Waste landfill in nearby Roxana.
"What it means is when a penalty is assessed sometimes we can divert a certain portion of it to a clean-up project that benefits the community, and that's what we did in this case," Carson said.
Washington Park is providing the personnel to clean up the dump, while the state EPA will provide for the disposal of the waste and recycling of tires.
The Illinois agency has cleaned up nearly 300 illegal dumping sites since 2006.
