WFAA-TV

DALLAS - State environmental officials are investigating the city of Dallas over the continuing hazards posed by two former landfills.

The tops of the landfills, which are located near the Trinity River and South Loop 12, are starting to erode and leak pollutants and deadly gas that pose an ongoing hazard.

Mounds of trash filled the illegal landfill, which is located at the soon-to-be site of the Trinity River Audubon Center, with hazardous wastes, which for decades was an unwanted neighbor for many living nearby.

The city of Dallas did little to nothing about it until Harold Cox filed a lawsuit.

"I was treated unfairly," he said. "I was treated deceptively."

When Cox and his neighbors won their lawsuit, the city removed, covered and remediated what was, up until the last year, still an environmental hazard.

But now, another former dump located right next door is posing new problems.

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality found "evidence of landfill cap erosion including exposed waste at the former South Loop 12 Landfill."

Across the road, at the Elam Landfill, the state found leaking gases, which tested as high as 30 percent for methane.

They are all hazards discovered by the state more than a year ago and are violations that have yet to be resolved.

"Methane gas is still being emitted," Cox said. "Someone strikes a match and someone [could] blow themselves up out here because it's still here."

Dallas City Attorney Tom Perkins said the city is well aware of the ongoing dangers, but said there is no need for residents to worry.

"We have constructed a barrier cutoff wall between the remediated site and the landfills over here," he said. "We have tested the northern side to make sure there is no migration of methane gas."

But the city continues to be out of compliance with state environmental rules governing the old landfills, which are just yards away from the Trinity.

Cox said the city has a history of neglect and deception and he has no faith in it now.