Landscaping companies turned away from storm debris bin sites on St. Thomas

CHARLOTTE AMALIE — The Virgin Islands Waste Management Authority is turning away landscaping companies trying to dump plant debris from Tropical Storm Ernesto at designated bin sites on St. Thomas, and the Bovoni landfill has not accepted any green waste since a massive fire nearly a year ago.

The situation has left landscapers and commercial haulers in an impossible situation, and businesses say they have nowhere to legally dump the huge volume of cut tree trunks and limbs, palm fronds, and other plant waste piling up after the latest storm.

“Especially because of Ernesto, it’s a problem,” Sandra Garnett told The Daily News this week. Garnett and her husband run their small business, Garnett’s Landscaping, with two employees, and she said they wasted hours on Thursday trying to figure out where to dump storm debris.