Madrid has new patrols to combat littering. Since January 12,mixed teams of municipal police and cleaning inspectors have been patrolling areas with the highest levels of illegal dumping incognito and have already imposed 111 fines in just one month, some of up to €1,100, mainly for leaving waste next to containers. The City Council insists that the aim is not to raise revenue, but to “improve cleanliness” and curb anti-social behavior that degrades the streets despite record investment in the service.
The mobile units report to the Deputy Mayor’s Office for Security and Emergencies, headed by Inma Sanz, and the Department of Urban Planning, Environment, and Mobility, headed by Borja Carabante. They are made up of municipal police officers and cleaning inspection staff who patrol without identifying themselves as a specific unit, observe the area around the containers, and issue fines when they detect waste left outside the containers.
In this first month, they have mainly been active in the districts of Centro, Salamanca, Tetuán, Puente de Vallecas, and Usera, with particularly problematic areas on streets such as Jesús, Marcelo Usera, Serrano, and Plaza de Pedro Zerolo. All the complaints have been for the same reason, mainly garbage bags, boxes, or bulky items left on the ground next to the containers instead of being deposited inside or at the corresponding recycling points.
Fines of up to €1,100 for a minor offense
Editorial credit: Al More | shutterstock.com
The penalties imposed by these patrols are covered by Law 7/2022 on waste and contaminated soil for a circular economy. Although the abandonment of household waste is considered a minor offense, the law allows fines of up to €1,100, an amount that the City Council has already applied in some cases to send a deterrent message to both businesses and individuals. Seventy-five percent of the 111 fines have been imposed on commercial establishments and the remaining 25% on citizens.
The City Council frames this surveillance as part of a “range of actions” against dirt: reinforcement of cleaning staff, specific teams to comb the area around containers, 24-hour neighborhood brigades for rapid response to incidents, and information campaigns aimed at businesses and residents on how and when to dispose of each type of waste. Special monitoring is also carried out on construction containers to avoid the “call effect” that generates improvised garbage dumps around them.