Getting to grips with load of old rubbish

By Frances Morton
Drugs, sex toys and dozens of empty bottles left over from a night of partying.
These are just some of the items people not so generously donate to the Salvation Army.
The amount of useless rubbish appearing outside the Cameron Rd shop is increasing as people clear out unwanted junk from their homes over the holidays, burdening the Salvation Army with rising disposal costs.
"It's certainly a case of you name it, we get it," said Salvation Army truck driver, Gareth Anderson, showing a pot plant saucer lined with two thin stalks of marijuana.
Allan Tiplady, the business manager of Salvation Army, said dumping was a problem year round but had noticeably increased over the Christmas period.
Salvation Army staff and volunteers process the donations daily and make regular trips to the dump to off-load unsuitable items.
Disposing of these items costs the community organisation between $400-$500 per month.
People deliberately leave an array of useless household goods outside the shop, including old couches, beds and mattresses.
"We have about 15 tonnes each month to dump. The council generously allow 11 tonnes a month for nothing, then we have to pay above that," said Mr Tiplady.
"It causes us extra costs to dispose of at the transfer station.
"This month will be a bit more," said Mr Tiplady.
Mr Anderson said staff were constantly faced with people dropping off unwanted items at the shop.
"We're battling with people. You confront them here dumping rubbish and they get nasty," he said.
Some people even left with the rubbish then returned at night to discard it when there was no-one around to stop them, said Mr Anderson.
The Mount Maunganui Salvation Army shop was particularly plagued by people taking advantage of the store as a dumping ground.
"They are running at 60-70 per cent rubbish a lot of the time," said Mr Anderson.
But not everyone making the most of the holidays to get stuck into work about the house were so thoughtless in disposing of their waste.
Hundreds of local residents visited Tauranga transfer stations during December, dumping last year's household and garden junk to make way for 2006.
Celebrations toasting the flipping of the calendar also boosted the volume of recycling handled by the transfer station.
About 1000 people dropped off their rubbish to be recycled at Maleme St or Te Maunga on the Wednesday before Christmas - the highest amount ever handled in one day.
The pre-Christmas clean-up continued throughout the month. Transfer station area manager, Jeff McLaughlin, said 85 tonnes of glass had been processed last month at Maleme St - 20 tonnes more than December 2004.
January is also expected to be a busy month for recyclers. The transfer station was closed on New Year's Day but January 2 was another hectic day with close to record numbers of people bringing in empty beer and wine bottles after end-of-year festivities.