OKTIBBEHA COUNTY – Dennis Daniels woke up on Sunday to find that someone had left another dozen tires on his property. It’s just the latest in a four-year tide of refuse he said has gotten bad enough to block the road going to his family’s land altogether.
Daniels and his cousin Loren Bell laid out their problem to the Oktibbeha County Board of Supervisors Monday, which eventually agreed that the problem had started when the county pushed an abandoned mobile home onto their parcel.
“People assume that it’s now a dump site, and people started dumping other waste there,” Daniels said. “Here recently that’s included concrete, construction debris, tires. It’s been blocking the road we use to access our property.”
Daniels told The Dispatch the mobile home was apparently being moved down Rockhill Road in January 2020 when something went wrong, leading the still-unknown owner to simply discard it in the middle of the road. The county cleared the road by moving the home to the side, onto the agricultural and recreational property owned by Bell’s and Daniels’ parents.
Both of the men stressed they don’t blame the county for moving the home and are grateful it is now helping them resolve the situation.
“It was an emergency situation. They needed to get it out of the road and it was a safety hazard so we didn’t mind them doing that,” Bell told The Dispatch Monday. “All of a sudden then it became, ‘Well you can have it,’ and I didn’t want it.”
Eventually the garbage being left at Bell and Daniels’ property progressed from household waste to outright construction debris. In 2024, someone left what seemed to be several dumptruck loads of concrete and rebar overnight.
“My son called me and said, ‘Dad, somebody dumped stuff in front of the old oil well road,’ and that’s the only access point to the property by vehicle,” Bell said. “… Whoever did this knew what they were doing. They found a dark spot and said, ‘Hey, we’re just going to dump it all right there.’”
Oktibbeha Road Manager Victor Collins told The Dispatch Tuesday that attitude is a common thread in the many illegal dumping incidents the county clears each year. He estimated there are roughly half a dozen major sites the road department clears regularly with a dedicated truck, and he said that dumping was less about landfill accessibility than when people had things to dump and think they can get away with it.
“It varies according to the time of year. I don’t know if it’s people moving out of apartments, it’s hard to say,” he said. “There used to be a landfill within the city limits at Rockhill Road. It’s been closed for five or six years after reaching capacity. … But it’s not necessarily about (distance to the landfill). More than anything, it’s isolated areas where they feel nobody will come while they’re dumping stuff.”
County supervisors are considering a variety of options to reduce illegal dumping. The current fine for illegal dumping is $500, but District 4 Supervisor Pattie Little said she supports increasing it.
“The current fine for illegal dumping appears insufficient to deter offenders,” she said. “Many individuals may view this penalty as a minor inconvenience rather than a serious consequence for their actions. … A possible increase in the fine and perhaps pairing it with community education efforts, we can send a clear message that illegal dumping will not be tolerated.”
District 2 Supervisor Orlando Trainer told The Dispatch on Tuesday he also supports increasing fines, though he also suggested expanding the county’s curbside rubbish pickup program. Currently the county has a dedicated truck for curbside pickups, though he said if there’s enough debris to require a contractor, disposal becomes the individual’s responsibility.
“We purchased a truck a few years back to pick stuff up, but we only have one running the whole county,” he said. “The city of Starkville has two of them running an area a fifth the size of the county. We need to increase the pickup, probably investing in another truck or adapting one we have. We need to educate people that it’s illegal.”
Trainer hinted the county might expand its efforts to monitor frequent illegal dump sites, hoping to catch the largest offenders. It doesn’t currently use cameras to monitor frequent dump sites, but it’s something the supervisors have talked about.
“They may have cameras up in a few places, but most places are so remote that the camera would have to be battery powered or solar powered,” Trainer said. “It’d be an expense for the county to get some and monitor these real problem spots. … We just have to figure out a way to do that sustainably.”
The county is taking more immediate action to clear Bell and Daniels’ property, voting Monday to contract with a private bidder to clear the site for roughly $5,000. The job is complicated by Tennessee Valley Authority power lines running over the site, which Collins told the board could ground themselves through an excavator even without direct contact. Whoever clears the site will have to bulldoze the debris to the side first.
“We can’t put a trackhoe under that line, because they told us if we raise the boom within 10 feet of that line, it could be catastrophic,” Collins said. “That line could actually find that machine.”
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You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 35 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
