Unaka – The community will be holding a large trash item pickup from 9-11 a.m. Saturday, March 14, at the Unaka Convenience Center.
Littering and illegal dumping are issues Cherokee County has faced for decades, but especially in the more rural edges of the county. The Unaka Community Development Club has held quarterly trash pickup days to help clean up the community, but issues with dumping furniture, appliances and other landfill items have persisted.
Others have issues with being able to travel or transport large items to the landfill in Marble, and leave these items taking up space on their property. Littering and illegal dumping come with the threat of punishment and fines and are detrimental to the environment, property values and health of the overall community.
The collaboration between the Unaka Community Development Club and Abernathy’s Trash Service aims to provide the community with a solution that will make their lives easier, while also making the community a cleaner and healthier place to live.
Illegal dumping and littering in Cherokee County are subject to significant penalties under state law and local ordinances. Depending on the amount and what is illegally dumped, an offender can face fines from $250-$2,000, up to 50 hours of community service and, in some cases, imprisonment for felony commercial littering.
When there is visible waste and trash, the local property values can drop up to 9%, which is significant for homeowners, sellers and developers. Homes become difficult to sell at competitive prices and hold a lower value because waste impacts neighborhood aesthetics, lowers the quality of life with unnecessary pollution and signals to buyers that there is a general lack of community care, hindering growth.
If hazardous materials are dumped in an area, there can be severe environmental and safety hazards as they can contaminate water and soil, which creates long-term, expensive, and dangerous damage that can harm the health of residents. When illegal dumping continues unchecked, this often attracts even more illegal dumping and can snowball to invite other more severe crimes into the area, making a place unsafe to live and further harming property values.
Unaka is one of the northern and more rural areas of Cherokee County, making it an ideal location for those looking to illegally dump unwanted trash. There are areas where appliances, construction trash, furniture, and general household garbage can be found thrown off the sides of the mountains.
Even with a quarterly roadside trash pickup, these items are far too large to be easily removed. The Unaka Community Development Club has partnered with Luke Abernathy of Abernathy Trash Service to provide the community with another option for their large trash items.
This means that the community can bring items such as furniture, mattresses, appliances, tires, etc., to the Unaka Convenience Center for Abernathy to take to the Cherokee County Landfill in Marble. This is a community-hosted and sponsored event that will not take place at any other convenience center in the county.
Abernathy will have a trailer and will be charging a small fee based roughly on the weight of the items brought to help cover the cost of taking the items to the landfill and the cost of gas for transporting the items. Do not bring liquid items such as paint, lacquer, gasoline, etc.
Details: The Unaka Convenience Center is at 12726 Joe Brown Highway. Abernathy Trash Service can be contacted at abernathyluke53@gmail.com or 828-557-8733.