NAPLES, Italy - The Italian army bulldozed shoulder-high piles of trash away from schools in the Naples area Monday as the government vowed to solve the city's largest garbage crisis.

Collectors stopped picking up garbage in Naples and the surrounding region on Dec. 21 because dumps are full. Political inefficiency, corruption and the influence of organized crime have contributed to a 14-year public emergency during which trash has often gone uncollected.

About 110,000 tons of garbage has accumulated in the Campania region, of which Naples is the capital, local media reported Monday. Although residents are angered by the uncollected trash, they have also blocked plans to create dumps or reopen old sites.

A proposed stop-gap solution - to reopen a dump on the outskirts of Naples that was closed after reaching capacity 11 years ago - outraged residents, who blocked roads and clashed with police Monday.

The standoff was the latest episode in Naples' long failure to deal with its pressing environmental problem.

Waste disposal - by burial or burning - has poisoned the enviroment so badly that people in some parts of the region are two to three times more likely to get liver cancer than in the rest of the country, Italy's National Research Council says.

Near Monday's protests, stray dogs pciked through trash on the streets. The stench of rotting food was in the air.

Hundreds of piles of rubbbish have been set alight by residents, prompting fears of high levels of cancer-causing emissions.

Prime Minister Romano Prodi held emergency talks Monday. His office said that "radical" solution will be proposed soon.

A massive incinerator that was supposed to open at the end of 2007 is not ready.