ROWAN COUNTY, N.C. -- Piles of trash are strewn along Wildwood Road in Rowan County. It looks and smells like a landfill littered with broken-down furniture smashed-up TVs, containers with hazardous warning labels and even dead animals.

April Reyes lives in the neighborhood and hates what she sees.

"It looks awful. People don't care, they just continue throwing their trash and it just looks really bad on the community," she said.

While Reyes drives by it each day, 86-year-old Raymond Everhardt drives to it. He owns much of the land and often sits in his pickup truck on the property.

Everhardt may be a deterrent when he's parked there, but it's obvious when he's gone loads of trash are brought in and dumped.

County leaders admit this is a big problem, but they don't have an answer. They said as unfair as it may sound, the clean-up responsibility falls squarely on the slumping shoulders of the elderly landowner.

The director of the health department said he plans to investigate.