Riverton pickers lash out at plans to close dump

Before the first rooster crows, scores of persons roll out of bed and creep across the Riverton Dump in St Andrew.

Picking their way through towers of trash, their aim is to find anything they can sell. This is not just work, it is survival! But in the not too distance future, they may have to find another way to eke out a living. On Sunday, Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness announced that the dump will be shut down, replaced by a sanitary landfill and waste-to-energy plant - part of a plan he says will fuel progress in St Andrew South.

"We have already identified where that will be and we have done the work on that, and we will decommission Riverton City as a dump as it is," Holness said.

"We will work with the communities that are in and around Riverton City, and eventually Riverton City will become the next frontier for economic development in Kingston," he added.

But for Ian Baker, and the scores of persons who depend on the dump for their economic survival, its closure could mean untold hardship.

"Mi go prison fi 10 years fi robbery and mi spend mi time because mi own di crime, but when mi come out the government never offer mi any employment," Baker told THE STAR.

He said that the dump has given him economic independence, stating that it "make mi eat and drink every day". The very thought of being displaced as a result of its closure has him worried.

"When dem take di dump now, what are you going to do ... come back for me and put mi back a prison?" Baker quizzed.

Another picker on the dump, Michael Carter, said the closure of the facility will only place them in an economic fallout.

"We nuh waah go trouble nutten fi nobody," said the 47-year-old father of two.

He told THE STAR that he makes his way to the dump from as early as 5:30 a.m. daily, searching for trash to turn into cash.

"A just the dump mi know about, and mi never do a next work inna mi life. If yuh can work hard you can make all a $50,000 or more a week time," said Carter, his hands blackened from sorting through waste for anything of value.

Yesterday, he sold enough plastic to buy shoes for his children who attend high school.

"If dem stop my food it a guh hurt mi really bad, because a it mi send mi pickney dem go school out of," he said.

Heaps of plastic containers, broken televisions, fans, Jacuzzis, metal and loom were observed in the vicinity where Carter sat, awaiting the arrival of a truck.

That is more cash!

"Mi get up early and go collect metal and loom and just about any other thing of value," he said. "If yuh nuh go out early, you may not get anything because is a lot of people out there. Whenever dem close di dump, dem a go mash we up," he said.

Nearby, Karen Breakenridge washes salvaged bottles for recycling. For her, the dump is part of a major economic ecosystem.

"They call it garbage but we call it an industry because that is what it is to us. I have been working the dump for about six years and it make ends meet. If the government close it, we gonna be affected very badly," she said.

Even those who don't work directly at Riverton are worried. Barry G, whose dwelling is located a stone's throw from the dump, knows of its importance to persons' economic stability.

"If it close, a wickedness a guh gwane, because a it the yute dem eat and survive off," Barry G said.

"Nuff a di yute dem buy dem truck and car from it, so when dem close down the dump, what dem leave dem to do?"