Continuing Coverage: South Bend Mayor addresses trash issues, solutions

SOUTH BEND, Ind.-- ABC57 has highlighted the issue of trash and illegal dumping on South Bend's streets, particularly on the west side. On Thursday, ABC57's Annie Kate had the opportunity to ask the mayor questions and explore potential solutions.

She also sat down with At-large Common Councilmember Karen White.

"When you’re just driving around, you see a lot of stuff," she said.

White is the longest-serving member of the South Bend Common Council, and the chair of the Residential Neighborhoods Committee.

"Can you imagine if you lived in a neighborhood and you lived around nuisance properties and all of this illegal dumping? And you're doing your best to keep your homes up and the value? You need help," White said. "You need help. It matters."

She's calling a public meeting on July 23 (details at end of article) to discuss the issue we’ve been reporting at ABC57: illegal dumping and other code violations on city streets.

"Because if it goes unaddressed, you know what happens," White said. "It increases and increases."

She also wants to help residents understand the processes to address trash issues.

"You live in this type of situation; your first expectation is you want it done immediately. But it doesn’t work that way," White said. "But it doesn’t mean we can’t clean up the city, and we need to find other strategies to do that."

She believes there’s more the city and its elected officials can do.

"We've got to monitor that," she said about the persistent dumping. "It's accountability. You can't come out with one cleanup, and then that's it."

ABC57 's Annie Kate caught up with Mayor James Mueller at the South Bend Police's quarterly public safety update. He said it's crucial residents report issues if they want the city to take action.

"It's a big city, and we do depend on residents reporting issues to make sure that we're able to address them," he said. "The illegal dumping, in particular, is a few bad actors who are really causing havoc in our neighborhoods. It's a tough issue to get on top of."

He says one major factor playing into the trash problem on the west side and beyond is the number of rental properties with out-of-state landlords.

"They just keep getting recycled from owners that aren't necessarily fully invested in the community," Mueller said.

He says the city is working to create what's called a land bank.

"The idea of a land bank is there would be an organization that could take this off that cycle of just moving through out-of-state property owners, and make sure it's getting into local hands that will be more responsible with what's going on," Mueller said.

Another way to help prevent illegal dumping is proper public lighting. The city has a "Light Up South Bend" program to pinpoint target areas for lighting, Mueller said. There's also the city's Lamppost Lighting program, a cost-share program offering lampposts for residential front yards.

Residents can report code violations by calling 311.

South Bend's Neighborhood Services and Enforcement department is not lacking in resources, Mueller said, but he has concerns about the future of all city programs as Governor Mike Braun's property tax law goes into effect.

"...is going to have tremendous impacts on our budgeting in the coming years, and so, we're going to be making cuts," Mueller said. "Not necessarily to this team, but generally, we're going to have to make cuts in order to meet the budget that the state has imposed on us."

Councilmember White's public meeting is next Wednesday, July 23, from 4 to 5 p.m. at the County-City Building, 227 W. Jefferson Blvd., in council chambers on the fourth floor.