Illegal Dumping in NYC: How to Report It, and How the Reward Works

Enforcement rises or falls on the evidence. The strongest submissions capture:

• The act itself. Video of material actually leaving the vehicle or being deposited is the gold standard. A pile discovered after the fact is a cleanup request; a video of the dumping is a case.
• The vehicle and plate. The plate is how the city identifies the dumper. Get it in frame, readable, even if you have to capture it as the vehicle leaves.
• Location and time. Include enough background to place the scene — a corner, a storefront, a street sign. Note the date and time when you submit.
• Continuity. One continuous clip beats a set of fragments. Do not stop recording to reframe if you can avoid it.

A safety note that should not need saying but does: record from a distance, do not confront anyone, and do not follow a vehicle. No reward is worth an altercation.

DSNY runs two distinct channels, and the difference matters before you hit send:

• The Tip Program (confidential). You submit what you saw — photos, video, plate numbers, times — and your identity stays protected. This is the low-friction path: the city gets the intelligence, you stay out of the case.
• The Award Program (reward-eligible). To collect a share of the fine, you have to stand behind your report — typically by signing an affidavit about what you witnessed. If the violation is sustained, the reward can reach up to 50% of the fine, up to $2,000 per DSNY's advertised terms.

The trade-off is straightforward: confidentiality or compensation. You cannot have both, because the reward requires evidence the city can rely on in an enforcement proceeding — and that means a named witness.

You have three practical routes:

1. 311. File an illegal dumping complaint through the 311 web portal or app. This creates the official service request record and gets the pile on DSNY's radar for cleanup and investigation.
2. DSNY's dumping tip email. Evidence-heavy submissions — video especially — can go to DSNY's illegal dumping tips channel (IllegalDumpingTips at dsny.nyc.gov), which feeds its enforcement unit directly.
3. Both. For a serious incident, file the 311 complaint for the paper trail and send the footage to the tip channel. The service request number ties your report to a trackable record.

If you want reward eligibility, say so in your submission and ask about the Award Program requirements — DSNY will tell you what documentation and attestation the case needs.

Honest expectations: the reward is a share of the fine, which means money changes hands only after the city identifies the dumper, issues a violation, and the violation is sustained. That process takes time — months is normal — and some reports never result in a violation at all, usually because the evidence could not identify who dumped.

This is why the plate matters more than anything else in your footage. A readable plate turns "someone dumped here" into "this registered vehicle dumped here," and that is the difference between a cleanup ticket for the city and an enforceable case with a fine — and a reward — attached.