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The Source: Southside Tire Yard Anything But 'Safe'

Google Map Aerial Photo of Site of Former Safetire disposal

The Safe Tire Disposal Corporation moved to its San Antonio Applewhite Road location in 1992 promising to grind up a quarter million used tires each month. The shredded tires could then be used as building materials or as fuel.

Texas was offering environmental incentives for the process but the business failed, and it left behind millions of discarded tires.

The tire site is located in State Representative John Lujan's District, 118.  He  says it's past time to clean up this mess.

“It’s just a breeding ground for mosquitos and Zika virus – the danger is real – and then with the fire – if this thing burns- a study was done and it would burn for nine months.”

Speaking on TPR's The Source on Wednesday Lujan said he met with the Scrap Tire Department of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to see what can be done.

“At the end of the day – the bad thing is the money is not there. But that’s not acceptable. Number one we’re going to find money. There’s also some things about maybe having the property taken over by somebody – somebody to purchase it and doing the tires and getting rid of the tires as part of their type business.”

Safe Tire Disposal also operated tire dumps in the DFW area, Odessa and Cleveland Texas. It received over 13 million dollars from the state which was supposed to be used to pay for the safe disposal of the tires. In 1995 three employees of Safe Tire Disposal were convicted of defrauding the state. TPR tried to reach the current owners of the property but received no response.

Guest:

  • John Lujan, Texas State Representative for the 118th district 
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David Martin Davies can be reached at dmdavies@tpr.org and on Twitter at @DavidMartinDavi