Philly Residents Being Punished with Fines for Trash, Despite Pickup Delays

Philadelphia is in the worst shape of its life. Not only is crime and violence at an all time high, but the streets are filthy. Take one look at some of the neighborhoods in the city and you would think they were garage drop-off sites.

Because of the ongoing global pandemic, there hasn't been enough workers to pick up trash around the city. According to Billy Penn, 25 percent of the Streets Department don't show up to work everyday because coronavirus related problems. As a result, trash has been piling up more and more, overflowing into the streets of Philadelphia.

“With more residents generating trash and recycling at home, and residents having more time to spring clean or work on in-home projects, we anticipated our tonnage would increase,” said department spokesperson Kelly Cofrancisco, according to Billy Penn.

Well they might have anticipated an increase, but I think we all can agree they definitely were not prepared. My boyfriend said he waited for the sanitation crew to come and collect his trash for a whole week. His trash bags along with his neighbors' bags started piling up to the point where you could barely walk on the sidewalk.

I hate to put the blame on the workers because they are doing the best they can with the little help they have. Times are hard right now and resources are limited.

“Our men and women have been working 16 months straight, for 10 to 12 hours a day, often six and, sometimes, seven days a week,” Omar Salaam, a business manager for AFSCME District Council 33, said according to WHYY. “The human body can only take so much.”

But the crazy part is the fact that the residents are now being punished for something that is out of their control. The city of Philly has been ticketing people for trash being left outside. According to Billy Penn, last month over a thousand tickets were given out because of garbage.

"Since its the city's responsibility for picking up the trash, I don't feel like it's fair for us to be fined for us putting our bags out on trash day like we're supposed to," Philly resident Tyler Lowery told WPST. "If you're not gonna pick it up what are we supposed to do, leave it in our house?"

Whatever the city plans on doing to fix this issue, it needs to be done quickly. Residents are getting angry, workers are exhausted and our city is disintegrating before our eyes.