Public control over the collection, storage and disposal of solid household waste: problems and prospects for development

Potapenko Sergei Viktorovich ORCID: 0000-0003-3013-5072 Doctor of Law Professor; Department of Civil Procedure and International Law; Kuban State University 350040, Russia, Krasnodar Territory, Krasnodar, Stavropol str., 149 niipgergo2009@mail.ru Other publications by this author     Goncharov Vitalii Viktorovich PhD in Law Associate Professor; Department of Civil Procedure and International Law; Kuban State University 350040, Russia, Krasnodar Territory, Krasnodar, Stavropol str., 149 niipgergo2009@mail.ru Other publications by this author

Petrenko Elena Gennad'evna PhD in Law Associate Professor of the Department of State and International Law, Kuban State Agrarian University named after I. T. Trubilin 350044, Russia, Krasnodar Territory, Krasnodar, Kalinina str., 13 niipgergo2009@mail.ru Other publications by this author

Introduction.

The Institute of Public Control in the Russian Federation is the object of close research in the works of A.V. Bezrukov, ^{[3, pp. 36-40]} E. V. Gerasimova, ^{[5, pp. 5-16]} T. N. Mikheeva, ^{[12, pp. 177-183]} L. A. Spector, ^{[7, pp. 194-196]} G. N. Chebotareva, ^{[14, pp. 26-34]} as well as a number of other authors. At the same time, special attention by scientists, in particular, Yu. V. Agibalov, ^{[1, pp. 57-73]} A.V. Cheshin, ^{[6, pp. 127-130]} V. V. Gribom, ^{[9, pp. 2-6]} A. L. Petelin, ^{[13, pp. 53-55]} is paid to modern problems that hinder the effectiveness of the functioning of this Institute of Civil Society. At the same time, a number of authors, for example, V. D. Gavrilova, ^{[4, pp. 42-44]} K. V. Kirillova, ^{[10, pp. 3-8]} N. V. Kichigin, ^{[11, pp. 76-85]} quite rightly note that the key direction of the development of the institute of public control in Russia and in the world in the coming decades will be public environmental control, without which it will be impossible to avoid a total environmental disaster on the planet. However, in our opinion, insufficient attention is paid in the domestic and educational literature to the modern problems of organizing and implementing public control over activities related to the collection, storage, and disposal of solid household waste, the "legitimate" and spontaneous landfills of which have become a real environmental disaster that has engulfed not only Russian megacities, but also almost all regional cities, most of the regional centers of the country. This circumstance determines the choice of the topic of this scientific research, the purpose of which is not only to identify and analyze the main above-mentioned problems, but also to develop (with justification) a system of measures for their optimal resolution.

The methodology and methodology of the study.

In the course of writing this scientific article, a number of general and particular scientific research methods were used, including: formal-logical; comparative-legal; historical-legal; statistical; sociological; method of analyzing specific legal situations. The empirical basis of the study was, in particular, the norms of the current legislation on public control, on state environmental control, materials of judicial practice, materials related to the practical activities of subjects of public environmental control.

The main text.

The Institute of public control in the Russian Federation, although it was formalized at the level of federal legislation relatively recently, has shown its high effectiveness and importance in the system of legal guarantees for the implementation, protection and protection of constitutional rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of citizens and non-governmental non-profit organizations.

Why is the institute of public control so important in comparison with other institutions of civil society?

Firstly, this institution of civil society is the most numerous. Its subjects permeate all levels of the administrative-territorial structure of the Russian Federation. Several hundred thousand people participate in the organization and conduct of public control events annually. At the same time, except for employees of state and municipal institutions, in the form of which the apparatuses of public chambers and councils of various levels have been created, providing organizational, legal, logistical support for the processes of organizing the activities of these types of subjects of public control, almost all representatives of subjects of public control perform their functions on a voluntary basis (free of charge).

Secondly, subjects of public control are endowed with a number of powers, the promotion of which is the responsibility of public authorities and other objects of public control (for example, in terms of providing information).

Thirdly, significant amounts of financing are provided by public budgets of all levels to finance the activities of subjects of public control.

The key area of public control in Russia is public relations in the field of environmental protection. What is the reason for this?

Firstly, in the last decade of the USSR's existence, the issue of environmental protection was one of the main topics that was widely discussed in society. And there were good reasons for that. In particular, for many decades in the USSR, both environmental disasters and the real threats of their occurrence and spread were hushed up. The last years of the USSR's existence were marked by gigantic environmental disasters, for example, the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Civil society was concerned not only about the fact of the accident, but also about the system of measures that was implemented after the accident, aimed at saving the population from the radiation contamination zone, which, in everyone's opinion, was planned and implemented insufficiently effectively. In this regard, mass rallies, demonstrations, picketing took place in the USSR, aimed at actualizing the need for a speedy solution to environmental problems, improving the environmental situation both in the country as a whole and in its individual regions. Thus, at the time of the Russian Federation's independence, there was already a powerful trend in civil society in the country, the purpose of which was public control in the field of environmental protection.

Secondly, the powerful environmental movement in the Russian Federation from the first years of its existence led to the fact that deputies of the supreme legislative (representative) body of state power by the local population, as well as public environmental organizations, were given numerous instructions regarding the need to legislate the possibility and necessity of the participation of institutions of Russian civil society in the organization and conduct of public events control in the field of environmental protection, which is currently carried out by fixing, for example, in Articles 68-68.2 of Federal Law No. 7-FZ dated 10.01.2002 "On Environmental Protection".

Thirdly, the relevance of public control in the field of environmental protection is obvious to any citizen of the country due to the fact that the level of a favorable environment is directly felt by the population in a constant time mode (air condition, availability of high-quality drinking water, soil pollution, problems of garbage collection, storage and disposal, etc.).

At the same time, one of the key modern environmental problems requiring coordination of the efforts of the state and civil society is the collection, storage and disposal of solid household waste. What is the reason for this?

Firstly, as a number of authors rightly point out, in recent decades problems have accumulated in the country due to the fact that the amount of solid household waste entering official and spontaneous landfills annually significantly exceeded the total capacity available in Russia for their processing. ^{[11, pp. 76-85]} At the same time, the Russian Federation (due to low tariffs for solid municipal waste management services from the population) cannot follow the path of Western countries, which export a significant part of solid household waste (especially high hazard classes) outside their territory for disposal and burial in garbage landfills of the "third world" countries (for example, Africa).

Secondly, the analysis of existing landfills, as well as the documentation on the basis of which they were opened, as noted by a number of authors, ^{[4, pp. 42-44]} shows that there are numerous violations of land and environmental legislation in the process of allotment of land for the construction and placement of landfills, medical and sanitary standards and At the same time, most of these violations of the law were identified by subjects of public environmental control, especially non-governmental non-profit environmental organizations.

Thirdly, according to environmental public organizations, the construction of enterprises for the disposal of solid household waste in the country is also a great danger. On the one hand, these enterprises are necessary to reduce the gross volume of solid household waste stored in landfills. On the other hand, their construction and operation should not violate the rights and freedoms of citizens of the country to a favorable environment (in terms of the location of these facilities, harmful emissions, etc.). In this regard, these issues should be monitored in real time by subjects of public environmental control.

Fourth, the so-called spontaneous landfills of solid household waste, or landfills that operate without any permits at all, pose a great danger. In some cases, land plots are allocated by municipalities to commercial organizations for a purpose unrelated to the placement of landfills. However, these sites are used for storing, in particular, solid household waste.

Currently, the implementation of public control measures in relation to activities related to the organization and implementation of the collection, storage and disposal of solid household waste is hampered by a number of problems, including the following:

Firstly, a major problem is the fact that the subjects of public environmental control, in fact, do not have any real authority to organize and conduct public environmental control in an independent mode. Thus, the analysis of Articles 68-68.2 of Federal Law No. 7-FZ dated 01/10/2002 "On Environmental Protection", Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 877 dated 06/28/2024 "On Approval of the Rules for Organizing the Activities of Public Environmental Inspectors", as well as the previously valid order of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology of the Russian Federation dated 07/12/2017 No. 403"On approval of the procedure for organizing the activities of public environmental inspectors" (expired), shows that the activities of public environmental inspectors are limited to assisting control bodies in carrying out control measures, for example, field surveys. However, article 68.2 of the above-mentioned Federal Law establishes the right of adult citizens not only to provide the above-mentioned assistance to public authorities carrying out state environmental control (supervision), but also to independently carry out public environmental control. It turns out that there is no direct prohibition for public environmental inspectors to independently carry out public environmental control measures, but there is also no detailed mechanism at the level of federal legislation for organizing and conducting these public environmental control measures in an independent mode.

The solution to this problem (taking into account the fact that public relations in the field of public environmental control are not subject to the norms of Federal Law No. 212-FZ dated 07/21/2014 "On the Basics of Public Control in the Russian Federation") is seen by us in the development and adoption of the Federal Law "On Public Environmental Control", which should enshrine the principles, goals, objectives, main forms and methods of organization and implementation of public environmental control measures. A system of real powers should be assigned to the subjects of public environmental control. It should be pointed out that the essence of public control is not limited only to the provision of assistance by its subjects to authorized public authorities in the field of state environmental control (supervision). Otherwise, it turns out that public environmental inspectors do not carry out public control, but we are talking about public participation in the management of state affairs (in terms of state environmental control (supervision). In this regard, it should be indicated in which cases, on what grounds, and also to what extent its activities can be independently initiated and carried out by subjects of public environmental control (with notification of their conduct to the above-mentioned authorized public authorities).

Secondly, a significant problem lies in the fact that the exercise of the right of citizens of the Russian Federation to participate in public environmental control as a public inspector is significantly limited by the institute for verifying their knowledge in the form of testing, which, moreover, is conducted by the Federal Service for Supervision of Environmental Management, whose activities, acts and decisions, in turn the queue is the object of public control! At the same time, for comparison, members of even the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation do not undergo any knowledge verification in the form of testing. We believe that such testing should be carried out only by non-governmental non-profit organizations. For example, in Federal Law No. 7-FZ dated 10.01.2002 "On Environmental Protection" and in the above-mentioned decree of the Government of the Russian Federation, it is possible to provide for the creation of an All-Russian Association of Public Environmental Inspections (membership in which can be made a prerequisite for their creation and operation), in which an Independent center for testing the knowledge of public environmental inspectors should be created the environment that will need to be entrusted with the organization and conduct of the above-mentioned testing. In this case, democratic principles will be strengthened in the formation and functioning of this type of subjects of public control.

Thirdly, a significant problem is the fact that public environmental inspectors have a weak organizational, technical, and material base of activity, which, indeed, reduces their functioning to an auxiliary function under authorized public authorities in the field of state environmental control (supervision). The solution to this problem, as we noted in previous studies, ^{[8, pp. 196-200; 2, pp. 3453-3463]} is seen in increasing the efficiency of this type of subjects of public control by strengthening their material and technical base, purchasing modern analytical equipment, digital technologies that allow conducting relevant research independently. Alternatively, the Government of the Russian Federation should be instructed to develop and adopt the Federal Program "On the Development of Public Environmental Control in 2025-2035", followed by its financing from the federal budget.

Conclusion.

In the course of our scientific research, we have made a number of conclusions:

1. Public control in the Russian Federation acts as a key legal guarantee for the implementation, protection and protection of the system of constitutional principles, as well as the rights, freedoms and legitimate interests of individuals and legal entities, the most important of which are related to ensuring the preservation and development of a favorable environment.

2. In this regard, the most important object of public control is public relations in the field of environmental protection, which is seriously threatened by the processes of collection, storage and disposal of solid household waste.

3. However, the organization and implementation of public control measures in relation to activities related to the organization and implementation of the collection, storage and disposal of solid household waste are associated with numerous problems, among which are: the lack of subjects of public environmental control a set of real powers to organize and conduct public environmental control in an independent mode; the presence of restrictions in the implementation of the right of citizens of the Russian Federation to participate in public environmental control as a public inspector in connection with the consolidation of the institute of verification of its knowledge in the form of testing, which, moreover, is carried out by an authorized body of public authority, which acts as an object of public control; weak organizational, technical, material base of the activities of subjects of public environmental control which, indeed, reduces their functioning to an auxiliary function under authorized public authorities in the field of state environmental control (supervision).

4. The solution to these problems is seen, in our opinion, in: a) the development and adoption of the Federal Law "On Public Environmental Control", which will detail the basics of legal regulation of public environmental control, including the processes of collection, storage and disposal of solid household waste; b) strengthening the democratic foundations of the mechanism for the formation of subjects public environmental control, for example, by democratizing the institute for testing the knowledge of public inspectors in the form of testing (through the creation of the All-Russian Association of Public Environmental Inspections with an Independent center for testing the knowledge of public environmental inspectors at it, which will need to be entrusted with the organization and conduct of the above-mentioned testing); c) strengthening the material, technical, organizational and legal base subjects of public environmental control, including through the development and adoption by the Government of the Russian Federation of the Federal Program "On the Development of Public Environmental Control in 2025-2035", followed by its financing from the federal budget.