Morris Park residents were completely fed-up with New York City’s “garbage” excuses three weeks after the major blizzard.
The community understands that the snow storm which hit the boroughs the day after Christmas was one of the worst in city history. By now, most of the Morris Park residents are no longer talking about the poor effort Mayor Bloomberg put into cleaning up the snow in the Bronx. Although the lack of snow removal was the focal point of complaints for some time, residents recently turned their attention to another growing issue. The problem in Morris Park: still no garbage pick-up.
The city resumed “limited” garbage pick-up in the five boroughs on Monday, January 3. Bronx residents knew and understood that it would take several days before all garbage was taken care of. However, by the afternoon of Tuesday, January 11, many streets and buildings in the community still had growing piles of garbage collecting on the sidewalk. President of the Morris Park Community Association Al D’Angelo feels that the whole situation has gotten out of hand.
“If you really think about it, the garbage hadn’t been picked up here since before Christmas Day,” D’Angelo said. “We all realize there’s a whole city to collect, but when garbage hasn’t been picked up once over a three week period, then we have a serious health problem in our community.”
Frustration in how poorly Mayor Bloomberg and the Department of Sanitation dealt with garbage pick-up was already present. Homeowners and tenants were beginning to get more upset when garbage still had not been picked up and another major snow storm was expected to hit New York City between Tuesday, January 11 and Wednesday, January 12. The concern of a further delay because of additional snow began to grow rapidly in the community. Residents began to voice their frustrations by calling local community board members.
Joe Bombace, a board member of Community Board 11 and resident of Barnes Avenue, explained to his neighbors that putting out more garbage would not help the situation. However, by the time three weeks worth of garbage piled up outside of residential homes, even Bombace lost his patience.
“I told everybody not to put as much garbage out, but after three weeks, it definitely got out of control,” Bombace said. “We knew garbage was suspended until further notice after the blizzard but it became an ugly sight when garbage still wasn’t picked up over a week after sanitation duties were resumed.”
Garbage was finally picked up from Morris Park’s “tertiary” streets on Sunday, January 16, an uncommon pick-up day for residents. The residents hope the normal pick-up schedule is resumed for the rest of the winter.
