Sometimes governments do really stupid stuff. First the state legislature said you couldn’t put old television sets and computers in landfills. That was perfectly understandable, since they contain all kinds of harmful materials.
It is the same with household chemicals, garden herbicides and pesticides, and old paint cans. You are’t supposed to put them out with the garbage. Again, understandable.
Unfortunately, no alternative was provided. So, you have an old TV. You have old paint cans in your garage. But you have no legal way to dispose of them.
What do people do? They throw them along the highway, dump them from dirt roads in the woods, or put them into informal and illegal dumps that spring up.
In this case, it is not only the dumpers who are irresponsible. The Pennsylvania legislature and municipal governments are also irresponsible.
The irony is that the cleanup from the illegal dumping will cost far more than if the state legislature provided money for electronic recycling and hazardous waste disposal collection sites.
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