Joan Gordon-Webley, executive director of the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA), looks at garbage that she said was dumped from businesses in a bin in New Kingston on Friday. - Norman Grindley

Head of the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA), Joan Gordon-Webley, says that businesses in New Kingston which flout the NSWMA Act will feel the full force of the law.

Webley, who took an enforcement team to New Kingston business district where four establishments were found in breach on Friday, called the situation an irony.

"They will call you if there is a pin on the street, yet still some of their very own will not comply; they just give persons money to dump their garbage anywhere. It will not be business as usual, they must dispose of their waste properly,'' Webley said.

None of the businesses served with notices to remove their garbage could produce a receipt from any garbage removal company contracted to remove their waste.

The operators told the enforcement team they normally pay a man to take the waste outside and throw it away. This turn out to be an expensive act as they will be fined $10,000 for each bag of waste that was found.

Representatives of one business said they paid a man to work for them. ''We don't have any receipts as we pay for the person to sweep the shop and take out the garbage,'' the representative said. The business was advised that as long as it is a commercial entity, it needs to make arrangement to properly removed and store its waste.

Philip Morgan, a senior investigator at the NSWMA, said if businesses served with notices to remove the garbage do not comply, a summon for disobedience will follow and individuals can be fined up to $100,000 on each count.

SOURCE: http://www.jamaica-star.com/thestar/20090330/news/news8.html