A new heat map, published on Lee County at first glance might lead someone to think its a map of population, development, traffic accidents of air pollution, but it's actually an Official Heat Map of all the documented illegal dumping across the county.
It's a recent addition to Lee County's Solid Waste's Website, and its pretty obvious to see that the most prominent area is concentrated around Lehigh Acres.
While illegal dumping in Lehigh Acres is nothing new, the approach to dealing with it is. So why has this rampant problem persisted, and what's being done to find a solution?
On the Eastern Edge of Lee County, along desolate, pockmarked and occasionally dirt roads, lives Jimmy Farrell. He's called Lehigh Acres home for decades.
"This is the Eastern Part of Lehigh. We are about a half a mile from the Hendry County line back here," Farrell said. "It used to be quiet and peaceful, but it's not anymore. You've got all these trucks and tractor-trailers going up all over the roads, dumping trash all over the roads..."
In the past decade, he's seen Lehigh Acres go from a smaller, isolated community of roughly 60 to 70 thousand people to an up-and-coming place to live that has doubled in population. It's now dotted with homes under construction, with heavy truck traffic everywhere.
But Jimmy's biggest complaint isn't the traffic or the noise. It's the trash.
"There is trash everywhere! I pick trash up every day, just bags of it!" Farrell added.
In just a single day of investigating, we found no less than 5 truckloads of various trash, from roofing materials, old cabinets, nails, tires, and even dumped animal carcasses, left to rot in the road.
Speaking to Gulf Coast News about it was Alain Capucci. He's the Vice President of an Organization called "Unite Lehigh." About a year ago, we met him in Lehigh Acres to talk about how his group's interest in incorporating Lehigh Acres as a City or Town.
"We need a better quality of life to live in Lehigh. Right now, we don't have control of anything..." He said.
His hope is that a local government and code enforcement office would be better able to address the dumping here, but since then, not much has happened.
"We do need more representation. We need people who can speak for us. I believe personally the county commissioners are doing what they need to do for now. They stepped up, and they are spending more money, but the best way for Lehigh Acres to represent itself is as an incorporated town, or as the City of Lehigh Acres It's the best solution for this. I know they disagree with this, but it is the best way." Capucci said.
But then at the last Lee County Commission Meeting, recent comments from Mike Giallombardo, one of Lee County's State Representatives came up.
"Actually there was an opportunity for the county, to work with Lehigh, its called LAMSID. Matt Caldwell actually created LAMSID in order to broker a deal between the county to have the basic ability to sidewalks, street lights, things like that. And the county refused to even bring it to the table..."
In his recent comments, Giallombardo was talking about the implementation of a "Single Member District." Earlier this year, he sponsored a bill in the Florida House that would add two additional commissioners to the Lee County board, one of which would directly represent Lehigh Acres, an idea that Capucci said he's open to.
"Single-member district is being planned by the state representatives. They want to add 2 more county commissioners, one for Lehigh Acres who can speak on your behalf. Great. We want someone who can represent us. But is it enough? No." Capucci said.
Overall, Capucci and other Lehigh Acres residents' hope to see leaders paying more attention to Lehigh Acres and its problems, particularly with illegal dumping, something Trish Fancher with Keep Lee County Beautiful has been trying to tackle in her own way, with community organized cleanups.
"I think it's a couple of problems. It's very rural, less eyes on people deciding to make that choice, and it's booming. You've got a lot of movement, people going in, people coming out," Fancher said.
Fancher explained that much of it boils down to bad contractors not disposing of garbage after finishing a job, which is why you see so many truckloads of construction materials.
"Some of it is obviously contractor work. What we are trying to educate people to vet your contractor. Its okay to ask for their dump ticket, once they have ripped your cabinet out of your house, chopped your palm trees. Its okay to say can I have the dump ticket to say yes we disposed of it properly, and didn't dump it on the side of the road. Its okay to ask for those things," Fancher explained.
In Lee County, it costs just under 70 dollars to dispose of a ton's worth of contracting debris, which means all the trash that you'll see dumped in random lots in Lehigh Acres was dumped so that the contractor could pocket that money instead.
That's why people like Trish, who care about Lee County and keeping it safe and clean, know that what's happening right now in Lehigh Acres has to change.
"But so its an education that again, what are these companies doing, we need to hold them accounable, what are they doing with these tires when they take them off of their trucks?" Fancher said.