The city of San Diego is launching a new effort to clean up nine specific areas of the city struggling with excessive litter and illegal dumping.

"We've identified nine hot spots for illegal littering and dumping," said Angela Colton, waste reduction deputy director in the city's Environmental Services Department.

A one-year pilot project will target Ocean Beach, Point Loma, Logan Heights, San Ysidro, City Heights, Paradise Valley. The project will also focus on three combination zones: Mission Beach/Pacific Beach, Webster/Mount Hope in southeastern San Diego and the South Bay area near the international border.

Mayor Kevin Faulconer included $800,000 for the program in revisions he made to his proposed budget for the fiscal year that began July 1.

Because the new program is a one-year experiment, the city plans to rely on workers supplied by the Urban Corps of San Diego instead of hiring new employees.

Many of those staffers work for the Urban Corps to fulfill community service requirements of plea bargains.

"They will be going to each of these nine areas throughout the week and picking up any illegal littering or dumping and identifying any graffiti and reporting that over to the Streets Division," Colton said.

Under the new program, which will supplement work already conducted by city crews and people on probation, each of the areas will be visited by crews cleaning up litter and dump sites at least four days a week.

While the workers won't be eradicating graffiti, they will help speed up the city's response by reporting it more quickly than private citizens generally do.

If you have any tips or complaints about excessive litter, illegal dumping or graffiti, click here to check out the “Get it Done,” app launched by the city last year.