Someone is dumping fats, oils and grease down the sinks or toilets in Cruz Bay, which is clogging up the St. John sewer lines, V.I. Waste Management Authority spokesman Stella Saunders said. She said the problem caused a manhole in Cruz Bay to overflow.

Saunders said when the authority cleaned it over the weekend, “there were clothes and a mop head in the line.” She said that particular problem caused a pump to trip, which made the sewage system go off line.

Saunders said crews have also pulled toys and pieces of wood out of the sewer system, but the overflow is suspected to have been caused by restaurant grease.

According to Saunders, it’s illegal for businesses to dump what she referred to as FOG – fats, oils and grease – into the sewage system. Instead, they’re supposed to hire haulers to get rid of it for them.

If the dumping continues, Saunders said, it will impact the new pumping station under construction adjacent to the parking lot located across from the post office.

V.I. Waste Management’s chief engineer, James Grum, said that next week crews will connect the final pipes on the system and that paving should happen in the following weeks. The work should be totally completed by the end of April, he said.

Saunders and Grum spoke to the Source before the start of a V.I. Waste Management Authority meeting called to discuss what Director May Adams Cornwall said would be the first of fees to be implemented by the agency.

The first set of fees will be called special waste fees and will be imposed on things like tires, white goods, electronics, used motor oil and fluorescent light bulbs that can’t be disposed of in the landfill.

Cornwall said the money collected would be used for administrative purposes as well as education. Some of that educational outreach is necessary to convince people to pay the disposal fee charged by tire sellers rather than taking their tires with them to dump in the dark of the night in VIWMA roadside garbage bins.

Those tires left in garbage bins and elsewhere then become the authority’s problem, and some of the money raised from the special waste fees will be used to dispose of them. The Susannaberg Transfer Station currently is home to a huge pile of tires illegally dumped at various locations around St. John.

“We are bearing the responsibility for people being bad actors,” Cornwall said.

Cornwall suggested that legislation be put in place to force tire buyers to pay the disposal fee.

Many of the dozen people who attended the meeting held at the Legislature building on St. John were small business owners who sell tires and rent cars. Several had questions about how the fees would be implemented.

Myrtle Barry, manager at E&C Service Station, said she needs to keep her prices affordable.

“It’s going to have a ripple effect,” she predicted.

During the discussion, Cornwall said some of the special waste fees would go toward hiring enforcement officers. She said the agency hasn’t been successful in hiring one for St. John, instead sending officers over from St. Thomas and St. Croix.

She urged residents who spot people doing things like dumping tires in the roadside bins to snap a photo to use as evidence.

The proposed special waste fees are as follows.
– $3 for Class 1 tires weighing less than 35 pounds;
– $6 for Class 2 tires weighing greater than 35 pounds;
– 50 cents per foot for fluorescent linear bulbs;
– $15 for televisions;
– $20 for floor stand fax/copier machines;
– $12.50 for computer servers and notebooks;
– $7.50 for desktop print, fax, copy and scan machines;
– $3 for telephones and cell phones;
– $3 for camcorders and recording devices;
– $10 for small Freon white goods and appliances (refrigerator) and $20 for large Freon units. A non-Freon unit (i.e. a washing machine) would be $10;
– and 50 cents per gallon for lubricating oils.

The plan also includes a fee for people to start paying for the disposal of their vehicles. The fee will be 15 percent of the vehicle’s annual registration fee.

The vehicle fee irked St. John Car Rental owner Albert Willis, who said this was one more fee in a long list that he has to pay to keep his vehicles on the road.

“At one point you’re going to bankrupt small businesses,” he said.