"An analysis of court records shows more than 180 citizens have faced criminal charges due to Chickasaw’s garbage policy. Experts fear the practice may not be isolated."

"CHICKASAW, Ala.—Shaquala Jackson’s three-year-old daughter screamed. A rat was scurrying across the bathroom floor.

“I grabbed the kids and ran out of the house,” she said.

Jackson said that was the day she knew she and her three young children could no longer live in Chickasaw, a small suburb just outside Mobile. The rats, she knew, were likely a result of the trash piling up in the carport adjacent to her rented home. But there was little Jackson felt she could do to fix the root problem.

The city wouldn’t pick up her trash. And it had charged her with “theft of service” over monthly garbage bills she couldn’t pay.

Jackson’s case is one of more than 180 incidents where Chickasaw residents have been criminally charged over past-due garbage bills since city leaders passed an ordinance allowing the practice in March 2021."

Lee Hedgepeth reports for Inside Climate News September 24, 2024. [2]