WORCESTER, Mass. - More Worcester residents are voicing their frustrations over littering in their neighborhoods as the city prepares to install additional surveillance cameras to monitor illegal dumping.

Charles Gurney III has lived on Gage Street for roughly 20 years, and said he’s constantly fighting an uphill battle to keep the space near his property clean.

“I’m out there once a week, sometimes twice a week,” Gurney said. “It’s been ongoing since I’ve been here.”

He believes his neighborhood has been particularly susceptible to illegal dumping because of a nearby dirt road people often bring their trash to. During a walk along this dirt road and the surrounding area, he pointed out a mattress, pieces of plastic, broken bottles and other debris.

“I’ve literally seen people just throw stuff out their window and drive away,” Gurney said. “I take pride in my surroundings, and I just can't understand why people do what they do.”

Gurney said it’s frustrating to see others not putting forth the same effort, and his concerns mirror a similar situation on Swan Avenue, a long, winding private road in Worcester.

In an interview with Spectrum News 1 last week, nearby resident Flavio Parente detailed the issues he’s had with people dumping trash illegally in the area, including a discarded trailer he noticed the prior weekend.

Mayor Joe Petty has put in a request ahead of Tuesday night’s City Council meeting for one of the city’s new surveillance cameras to be installed on Swan Avenue.

As for Gurney and the concerns about trash in his neighborhood, he’s hoping the city eventually becomes more responsive to he and his neighbors’ concerns about the piling trash.

“They’re good enough when they come around on trash days, but they tend to leave a lot of bags that have a slight tear. I don’t know if they say anything to tenants, but those bags get destroyed and everything is all over the place," Gurney said. "To make people accountable also might help, and I don’t know if that’s knocking on the door, but I would just like to see them pick up when we call or when anybody calls.”

Grant funding from the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection will help pay for the city’s new cameras, which will be strategically placed in areas where people have been repeatedly dumping trash.

It's a tactic the city had already been using, but the grant funding will help expand from two cameras to six.

In an interview earlier this month, chief sustainability officer John Odell said it’s part of a larger strategy to deal with waste management in Worcester.

"This is a piece of the larger puzzle, we're trying to make sure that we properly manage our waste," Odell said. "The longterm solution is getting to a zero waste program throughout the city. That includes minimizing illegal dumping, but it also includes recycling, maximizing recycling efforts, minimizing the amount of trash that goes to the incinerator and so on."

If people are caught dumping trash in Worcester, they face a minimum $200 fine, but offenders could be fined up to $2,000.

The cameras will be managed in collaboration with the Worcester Police Department.