COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA COMMITTEE ON STREETS AND SERVICES Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Monday, March 3, 2025 1:47 p.m. PRESENT: COUNCILMAN JEFFREY YOUNG, JR., CHAIR COUNCILMAN MARK SQUILLA, VICE-CHAIR COUNCILWOMAN NINA AHMAD COUNCILWOMAN CINDY BASS COUNCILWOMAN KENDRA BROOKS
Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to Philadelphia City Council's Committee on Streets and Services. I now note that the hour has come. My name is Jeffrey Young. I'm the Councilmember for the 5th Council District. I'm also the Chair of the Streets and Services Committee here at Philadelphia City Council. Mr. Pullin, would you please call the roll.
Present. Thank you, Mr. Pullin. Also joining us is Councilmember Anthony Phillips, who is not a member of this Committee but is the sponsor of the resolution that we will be hearing today. Again, I will note for the record that a quorum of the Committee is present and now this hearing is called to order. Mr. Pullin, would you please read the title of the resolution.
Resolution No. 240827 titled, Authorizing the Committee on Streets and Services to examine the City's response to illegal dumping, focusing on monitoring high-activity areas, enforcement strategies and the development of effective tools to combat this issue. Illegal dumping threatens the quality of life in our neighborhoods and communities, undermining our shared mission to transform Philadelphia into the safest, cleanest and greenest big city in the nation.
Thank 16 you, Mr. Pullin. 17 Before we proceed, I 18 just want to note to the folks who 19 are here I want to thank you all 20 for coming down to testify today or 21 to listen to your City Council. 22 This is a very important issue that 23 is near and dear to every single 24 Councilmember's heart. We all live in Philadelphia. We all see what you all see on a daily basis. And so, we want to hear from you and get your perspective on how we as a city can be doing better. We do note that there are improvements that have been made since Mayor Parker and the Parker Administration have come into office. I see tenfold, you know, the changes that have happened in our city. But we do know that of course there still are some bad actors who, for the most part from what I've seen, a lot of those folks don't live in these neighborhoods that they're doing all this dumping in, wreaking havoc in. And so, we want to talk to you, hear from you about what other solutions are possible in this to keep our city the cleanest city in America, as the goal of the Mayor. But at the same time, we also want to note that we do have a workforce who day-in and day-out try their hardest to keep our city clean. I can say for the record that when my office has called to look at, to go out to investigate short-dumping sites and trash, we've gotten responses within hours. And I think again that's a credit to this Administration's efforts to making the city clean and green. And those folks who are members of D.C. 33, members of CLIP, again they work hard day-in and day-out. They're Philadelphia residents just like you and I are, and they make sure to get the job done that's at hand in front of them. So I want to make sure that we also commend those workers as well who keep our city clean and green on a daily basis. And with that, before we proceed is there any member of the Committee that would like to give any remarks before we start the hearing? Is there any -- Councilmember Phillips. Chair recognizes Councilmember Phillips.
Thank you, Chairperson Young, colleagues and all those testifying today in support of Resolution No. 15 240827. Illegal dumping is not just an eyesore in the city of Philadelphia. It is a direct threat to public health and neighborhood stability and environmental sustainability. One of the most impacted areas in the 9th District is Newtown Avenue, which is also better known as Snake Road here in the Lawncrest neighborhood of the 9th District. This road is a vital road in the 9th District, is frequently used by residents, yet has become a hot spot for persistent, large-scale illegal dumping. Neighbors have shared their frustrations with myself and other leaders time and time again, and I've been out there with community leaders like Dallas, Heather, Dr. Brown, Phil, Bill, State Representative Anthony Bellmon, the Lawncrest Civic Association as well as 215 People's Alliance and so many others who have come together to clean up this road. And we're constantly cleaning up this road. We've partnered with Justin DiBerardinis and the Tookany/Taconey-Frankford Watershed partnership to fight back against illegal dumping. But enough is enough. So that is why I authored the legislation authorizing this hearing that will examine the City's response to illegal dumping. Our goal is to gain a clear understanding of the effectiveness of our monitoring, enforcement and prevention strategies. Now, we know that Philadelphia spends nearly $48 million annually on cleanup efforts which is remarkable. Yet the majority of that funding goes towards abatement rather than prevention or enforcement. So this approach is not as sustainable as we would like and we must do more to stop illegal dumping before it happens. Through this hearing, it is our hope that we gain a clear understanding of the effectiveness of our current enforcement strategies, are we holding illegal dumpers accountable and what improvements can be made to prevent these efforts of illegal dumping. The issue is urgent because illegal dumping disproportionately affects our most undeserved neighborhoods, where waste collection resources are often limited and vacant lots become dumping grounds. So roads like Snake Road should not be dumping grounds. They should be safe, clean spaces for all Philadelphians. This is about equity, public health and quality of life. And hot spots remain persistent problems with everything from discarded tires, as you can see a visual right there, to construction debris accumulating in our neighborhoods. Delays and removal requests leave neighbors to be burdened with environmental hazards reinforcing cycles of neglect and creating public health risks. So I just want to add that I just met with someone today. And one of the things that he said to me, his name is David, he's going to be testifying today, he says he wants to be put out of business because he's one of the people who continues to clean up all the time. So today's hearing finally is a step towards ensuring Philadelphia becomes the cleanest, safest and greenest big city in the nation. I appreciate those who are testifying today and I look forward to working with our colleagues, City agencies, community stakeholders to create long-lasting solutions to break a cycle of illegal dumping once and for all. So let's work together. Let's get this done. And I think we're going to hear a lot about the cleanup efforts, right. But the problem is, is that we have to get to a point where the cleanup efforts are no longer there. And I think we can do that with hearing from the experts today. So hopefully they can give us some ideas on what we should be doing and how we can get better at it. So thank you to all who came today. Thank you. I'm here for you all. This is why we're doing it. Thank you. (Applause.)
Thank you. The Chair notes the presence of Council President Kenyatta Johnson. Thank you for joining us, sir. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Harrity.
Thank you, Chairman. Anthony, thank you for putting this bill in. I live in Kensington. We can't seem to get away from problems like this. We were able to evict the drug dealers off the top of my corner, but now they decide to start illegally dumping on the top of my corner. So I just want to thank you. This is a citywide problem. This isn't related to just one neighborhood, but I thank you for taking an initiative to speak up and get us in this room 17 together. So I thank you. And just on that note, I have to thank the City employees, Carlton Green -- Carlton Williams. Every time I call and I was -- well, I called you, what, they did it three days in a row, right. Three days I came home, we cleaned it up and they did it again. And they came out and took care of it as fast as they could. Especially when you live on the block and you're a Councilman, as soon as they dump the neighbors are right at my door, you know what I mean. So somebody had to do it. I'm glad it was you. And thank you and thank all the City employees also and anybody that is cleaning and keeping Philadelphia clean and green. Thank you.
Thank you. Chair recognizes Council President Johnson for remarks.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also want to thank Mr. Phillips from Northwest Philadelphia for taking the lead on this issue and making sure we address the issue of illegal dumping, which is a severe quality-of-life issue that we are addressing here in the city of Philadelphia. I'd be remiss if I just didn't acknowledge the efforts of the head of Clean and Green, Mr. Carlton Williams. Thank you for always being on the case when I call rather it's -- (Applause.)
-- 10 o'clock at night, text message 11 o'clock at night, text message 12:30 in the morning. I just thank you for your leadership. And also Mr. Keith Warren, I want to thank him as well for always just being on the case from the sanitation standpoint. And obviously, Ms. Crystal Jacobs as well, the head of the Sanitation Department. So we just thank you for y'all leadership, the things you're working on. And through the leadership of the great gentleman from Northwest Philadelphia, we know we're working in partnership and want to take this issue to the next level and as he said, eliminate the issue of illegal dumping. And also littering, my children that I raise in my household, one is 10 and one is 8, they know not to throw any type of trash outside the car, on the ground where we're walking. And when they see other people doing it, they kind of give them a cock- eyed look like, hey, dad, hey, mom, what's up with that person, they're littering, right, because we teach it inside the household, even to the point of recycling, right, that's what we do inside the household. And so, when they go outside because it's learned behavior and they see it, their friends are doing it and somehow it's abnormal behavior when they see it because of how we're raising our children. So education, I believe, plays a major role in terms of us becoming the cleanest, greenest city in America and I believe education plays a major component. But also, the possibility of banning those who are illegally dumping in the city of Philadelphia. So if you're a contractor and you decide to not go to the city dump, right, and decide to dump that trash in our neighborhoods, you should be banned from doing work in the city of Philadelphia forever. You shouldn't be able to get a permit. You shouldn't -- (Applause.)
-- get a chance to do any type of business, right. And so, I don't think a fine is enough. Once you ban one or two companies from illegally dumping in our neighborhoods, especially you got homeowners who have spent their life-earned sweat and money to own a home, to maintain their home and then you come out in the morning and you see a couch sitting at the top of your block or you see a toilet dumped in the middle of the street, right, when we find out who actually did that illegal dumping, I would think and I would hope that our mission is to ban those individuals from having the opportunity to do business. And from a law enforcement standpoint, right, to make sure that they're held to the highest extent of the law from a prosecutorial standpoint. And we worked on those issues in Southwest Philadelphia around holding people accountable from a law enforcement standpoint. And so, I just want to thank you. But most importantly, I just thank Councilmember Phillips for his outstanding leadership and stepping up to the plate and Mr. Chairman for making sure that this is scheduled properly on time, and it's before the budget process as well. And so, we thank you very much. And shout-out to Tom Conway and the CLIP program. These are the bread-and-butter folks who make sure that we're addressing the most basic issues here in the city of Philadelphia, and that's making sure we have clean and green neighborhoods. So thank you very much. And, Mr. Phillips, thank you for allowing me to sit here. (Applause.)
Thank you, Mr. President. Chair recognizes Councilmember Ahmad.
Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council President, for those very impactful remarks. I just wanted to echo and say, hear, hear, to all of them. But I especially wanted to just say thank you to Carlton because he has, as everybody noted, been on top of every time we say anything, it gets done and it's an appreciable difference in how things happened before. And what we need to do is have a culture change. Council President spoke about his children understanding what littering is and the impact of that. This is going to be a culture shift as we do a culture change because what clean and green is doing is changing how people perceive Philadelphia. This is not just littering, not just dirty things, but it has an impact on who comes to Philadelphia, who spends their money in Philadelphia, what our revenue looks like. So we are coming onto 2026. We need to get ourselves organized. So we're going to have visitors globally coming from everywhere, every corner of the earth coming here. And we want to make sure they go away saying Philadelphia was a clean, safe and fun city. I know we are a great city with a lot of communities who are fully engaged and have stayed engaged, even though sometimes they didn't see results. Now, you're seeing results. And I hope your advocacy really is driving why we're here. And I want to thank my colleague Councilmember Phillips for making this happen because as the Chair of the Public Health Committee, this is a health issue. This is a health and wellness issue and not just physical health and wellness, but how we mentally feel about our surroundings. When you disinvest in a community, the community feels like they don't matter, and that's what you're shifting and changing. And that's the culture change I support, and anything I can do to be helpful I will. As Councilmember At-large, all of Philadelphia matters. So thank you again to everyone, particularly to D.C. 33 members, our CLIP organization and all the community who stay engaged to make sure that this culture change happens. Thank you. (Applause.)
Thank you, Councilmember. Mr. Pullin, would you please call the first witness to testify on this resolution.
The first witness to testify can we have Dallas Herbert, Diane Payne --
The first witness to testify is Carlton Williams, Director of the Office of Clean and Green Initiatives. (Witness approached Witness table.)
Good afternoon, Mr. Williams. Please state your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.
Thank you, Councilmember Chairperson. Good afternoon, Chairperson Young and the honorable members of City Council Streets and Services Committee, and of course our Councilmember from the 9th District, Councilmember Anthony Phillips. My name is Carlton Williams, Director of Clean and Green Initiatives for the City of Philadelphia, and I am pleased to be here today to testify on Resolution No. 240827 sponsored by Councilmember Phillips to address the response to illegal dumping. The Honorable Mayor Cherelle Parker's vision is to ensure that Philadelphia is the safest, cleanest, greenest big city in the nation with access to economic opportunity for all. In her first 100 days in office, Mayor Parker established an action plan to help implement the vision for the city. The action plan had three major goals: First, to create a Clean and Green cabinet consisting of government officials, industry professionals, businesses, community-based organizations, nonprofit organizations and community leaders to develop best practices for cleaning and greening the city, combat illegal dumping, reduce waste and improve the city's environmental footprint. Two, to create a new approach to addressing persistent quality-of-life issues, issues such as short-dumping, litter, graffiti, potholes, nuisance properties and abandoned autos. Responding first to the hardest-hit neighborhoods, using a public information system to show progress and partnering with community-led cleanups and efforts. And three, to develop and expand key leader prevention programs such as PHL TCB Program to cover more commercial corridors, more frequent cleaning of existing corridors and increasing the number of participating organizations. The Office of Clean and Green was established to carry out the vision and goals for the city of Philadelphia. The Office Clean and Green has made significant progress with implementing many of the Mayor Parker's vision. In 2024, Mayor Parker signed an Executive Order establishing the Clean and Green cabinet and charged them with providing recommendations to the Administration to address some of the most challenging quality-of- life issues. I am pleased to say that the Clean and Green cabinet has submitted a report with recommendations that are currently being reviewed by the Administration that will be made public in the near future. The Office of Clean and Green implemented several key initiatives, approved and funded in the passage of the FY25-26 budget by City Council to address quality- of-life issues throughout the City, using the Mayor's goal of developing a proactive intergovernmental strategy that residents can see, touch and feel. So what does this strategy include? More cleaning. In June 2024, the Office of Clean and Green launched the One Philly United City citywide cleanup. Over a 13-week period, more than a dozen City government and quasi government agencies worked together to address multiple quality-of-life issues in every neighborhood, block-by-block. These agencies included Sanitation, Streets, Community Life Improvement Program, Commerce's PHL TCB, Parks and Recreation, Licenses and Inspections, the Police Department, the Philadelphia Water Department, the Philadelphia Parking Authority, the Philadelphia School District, Mural Arts Program, SEPTA and the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. The cleaning program was such a tremendous success and is now standard operating procedure for the city of Philadelphia. The One Philly, United Citywide Cleanup will now be conducted twice per year in every neighborhood on a 13-period week schedule. The first cleanup took place last June. The first cleanup this year will take place in May and will last from May, June and July. And the second cleanup will take place in the fall, November, December, January each year.
The One Philly, United Citywide Cleanup has already performed over 100,000 quality-of- life services to date, and we have used the work performed during those cleanups to establish a new community appearance index that aggregates in ways quality-of-life issues starting with illegal dumping by zip code. The CAI will ensure that we provide equitable services and know where they are needed the most. In this testimony I've provided a chart, but I won't go through it due to the brevity of time. I want to continue to move on. We're providing more street cleaning and extended trash collection, more BigBellies and a new bulk collection program all to combat illegal dumping. The Office of Clean and Green and the Sanitation Department under the leadership of Crystal Jacobs Shipman, developed several other initiatives designed to reduce litter and illegal dumping. The City Council District Residential Cleaning Program has cleaned an additional 30,000 blocks in all 10 Council Districts across the city to improve the quality of life for all citizens. The Council Residential Cleaning Program operates on a daily schedule where every block in each Council District is cleaned multiple times a year. Thus far, Councilmembers have only submitted 47 requests out of 30,000 blocks clean. And we are deploying these crews as our eyes and ears to identify other quality- of-life issues in neighborhoods to make referrals to our intergovernmental partners implementing the Mayor's proactive approach and vision. The crews use an innovative smartphone application to record each street that is being cleaned, log each quality-of-life issue to show where they're working and how to demonstrate accountability. Again, the numbers that you have in the testimony highlight all of the work that has been done thus far and they've cleaned over 30,000 blocks. In summary, in December 2024 the Office of Clean and Green and Sanitation piloted twice-per- week collections in South Philadelphia and Center City that provides an additional collection day for residents living in densely populated communities. The program is designed to reduce residential illegal dumping on vacant lots, around BigBellies, along commercial corridors and parks and recreation centers. Due to limited storage capacity, we'll be expanding the program to other locations in the fall of 2025. OCG and Sanitation will continue expanding mechanical street sweeping in our most litter challenge sections of the city. We will be expanding the boundaries of the existing locations to help 16 control street litter. 17 The Office of Clean and 18 Green and Sanitation are presently 19 installing additional BigBelly 20 solar-powered trash cans. That will be placed along neighborhood commercial corridors to reduce the amount of litter and trash from pedestrians and commercial districts. And we are currently installing over 1500 additional units throughout the city of Philadelphia. The majority of those units are placed outside of Center City. And Sanitation also reintroduced a citywide bulk collection program that's collected over 5000 items since the program launched in October of '24. Bulk collections reduced the amount of unwanted furniture and televisions that are commonly found in illegally-dumped locations. All of these new programs begin to show promising results. Data from our 311 system show illegal dumping complaints have dropped nearly 20% across the city this year compared to this time last year. Notably, the complaints in South Philadelphia, Center City, where twice-a-week collections were introduced in December, have dropped by 30% outpacing the citywide increase. In addition to sanitation services, CLIP and PHS are great partners in our fight against litter and illegal dumping. CLIP, the Community Life Improvement Program, and PHS, the Pennsylvania Horticulture Society, have cleaned over 17,000 lots during the two citywide cleanups.
With Mayor Parker's investment, PHS has for the first time expanded the LandCare Program to clean 13,000 lots year-round, creating full-time jobs. This expansion has been extremely helpful in preventing illegal dumping in open spaces. CLIP, under the leadership of Tom Conway, has also been very effective in maintaining vacant lots and removing graffiti. In addition to lot cleaning, CLIP has removed over 180,000 graffiti vandalism locations in 2024. And the 311 graffiti complaints have decreased dramatically, over 50% from the previous year. Commerce's PHL TCB Program under the leadership of Director Alba Martinez and Dennis Murphy has also been a great partner in our efforts to reduce litter and illegal dumping. PHL TCB is currently located in 129 commercial corridors throughout the city, in partnership with 39 cleaning organizations and will be expanding the number of areas, hours and locations of their cleaning efforts. PHL TCB groups have been funded to work longer shifts and expanding of hours and boundaries to clean adjacent to the corridors and neighborhoods. TCB will also be expanded to new locations this year as applications for new service areas are currently being reviewed for awards. We're also investing in expanding, that was stated earlier, more enforcement. We just can't keep cleaning up our neighborhoods. Enforcement is a critical component to reducing a prevent -- preventing illegal dumping throughout our city. We're extremely pleased with the partnership we have with our Law Department, Streets Department and Police Department. Our investment in surveillance cameras that have been strategically placed in known hot spots have resulted in arrests and decreased dumping across the city. Under the leadership of Commissioner Kristin Del Rossi, we will continue to expand our mobile camera network to monitor locations that experience frequent illegal dumping. The Streets Department has worked closely and currently installed over 300 cameras specifically to catch illegal dumpers. This is in addition to the work that we've done with the police department. We will expand the number of cameras by 100 this year to other locations and hold illegal dumpers accountable. In addition, we use the Police Department's existing camera network to increase our monitoring capabilities. And finally, we're extremely pleased with the Law Department's newly ramped-up efforts to combat illegal dumping. Under the Leadership of City Solicitor Renee Garcia, we have successfully litigated over 50 cases, resulting in more than $3 million in judgments and obtained and received over $200,000 in settlements from illegal dumpers in 2024. This is a result of the recent legislation passed by City Council, which allows the Law Department to use the civil procedures to fine dumpers up to $5,000 per item per incident. This new procedure has been a cornerstone in our efforts to prevent illegal dumping and hold violators accountable. And finally, we're pleased to announce that our efforts are in Clean and Green continue to have been recognized and supported by our philanthropic community. 7 million from the William Penn Foundation to join the fight against illegal dumping. These funds will be used in partnership with community-based organizations to fight illegal dumping in neighborhoods across the city and on the front lines. The combination of these programs launched in just the first year of the Parker Administration is making a significant difference and a positive impact on litter, illegal dumping and other quality- of-life issues across the city. We could have not made this progress without the support of the honorable members of City Council who passed the budget and legislation to help improve the quality of life for all residents who live, work and visit our city. Together we are making Philadelphia safer, cleaner and greener. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. And I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have at this time.
Thank you, Mr. Williams, for your testimony. I just have a couple of questions related to your testimony. So in your testimony you've outlined a number of ways that the Parker Administration has increased or enhanced their response to illegal dumping and littering. And you mentioned there are currently 300 cameras in place to specifically catch illegal dumpers and you're looking to expand that number by 100 locations this year. Could you talk to us and talk to the public about how these locations are selected? And I guess a timeline, I guess, essentially, for the newer cameras?
Sure. Thank you, Council Chairperson Young. First of all, the cameras are very effective in terms of monitoring those locations where we traditionally have to clean up 311 complaints. We usually get them from many community members, 311 and basic locations that we know constantly get dumped on, and those are the locations that we target first for illegal dumping. Multiple times throughout the year we've cleaned it up. I'll give you an example, Snake Road that Councilmember Phillips talks about. Frequently we clean that up at least once a week or once every two weeks. That is a place where we would identify for additional cameras. We do that throughout the City of Philadelphia based on 311, data, and that information is given to us so that we can install appropriately. We then work with our Streets Department -- I see Deputy Commissioner Rich Montanez and his team is here -- so that we can install those cameras where we have fiber optics, and we're also investing in mobile cameras that are wireless. This would allow us to expand our reach even greater in places that are traditionally not easy to install cameras, like our Parks & Recreation. I see Deputy Commissioner Sue Buck is here. We work very closely with them to identify locations that you have presented here to try to place those cameras to catch those dumpers. So that's basically how we implement the program. Each year based on resource availability and our staff and tech members to install, we install those cameras throughout the periods of the spring and summer, fall and have them up and monitored by a surveillance team under Commissioner Shipman's office, so they're constantly looking for footage of who's doing the dumping, looking at license plates, identifying people who come into those areas, and that's basically the evidence that's needed by our Law Department to bring them to justice to hold them accountable so that we can issue those harsh fines passed by City Council.
Thank you. And you mentioned there were 50 cases resulting in more than $3 million in judgments. Is there any data on what has occurred regarding civil liabilities in the past or past administrations versus what we're doing now?
I can get that for you, Councilmember. I can tell you it was very low and pretty much nonexistent when it came down to legislation and criminal procedures. Under the criminal process, it was very difficult to get them into police and municipal court, which is why we switched to this new process. So the case is if we caught them before we put those cameras up, we'll sit for long periods of time and pretty much no 11 enforcement will happen on the back end. That was one of the challenges and problems, which is why we switched to a new civil procedure. The rules of evidence is not as stringent, number one. Number two, when we're able to hold them accountable, it is up to the defendant to prove that they did not commit the act. And normally, we usually have them on camera by license plate no. and by visual appearance. And ultimately, we can hold them accountable that way. The best part of that is that many people recognize that they're caught and they want to settle before they go to court and pay out and pay our Law Department direct funds without having to actually go in front of a judge. So it has been very effective and we want to continue using that program as an enforcement tool to curb illegal dumping.
Thank you. You mentioned that there are going to be two additional citywide cleanup days. And this is in addition to the typical April cleanup, spring cleanup that the city has. Could you elaborate a little bit more on what those cleanups will entail?
Sure. That massive One Philly, United Citywide Cleanup consists of over agencies. That's not just picking up trash and litter. We're addressing all quality-of-life issues, including graffiti, illegal dumping, abandoned autos. Last year alone just during those two cleanups, we cleaned up or removed nearly 4717 abandoned autos. We've also --
I can 11 tell you 800 of those are probably 12 in my Council District. 13
Yes. So we're happy to say -- and that was a part of their overall collective effort to remove nearly 12,000 abandoned autos. So the combination between the Parking Authority and the Philadelphia Police Department is actually working as we're proactively looking for cars and not waiting for complaints to come in. They actually go out and monitor blockby-block where those abandoned autos are coming. So we're seeing a huge impact on the amount of abandoned autos that are being addressed by those two agencies. And I mentioned Parks and Recreation is a huge part of it. They do intensive cleaning of our recreation centers and they're not just regular cleanups, but they're repairing basketball courts, repairing benches, removing graffiti and doing an extensive amount of cleaning in those parts and areas all combined together and not waiting and doing it piece-by- piece or one at a time. We're working together, we're collecting the data and we're meeting monthly to talk about ways in which we can expand and improve those operations. That happens twice a year. The second part of that cleanup happens in the winter months because we want to align with our leaf collection program and expand that service. I'm happy to say we've cleaned an additional 2500 locations with leaves this year, which is a big concern for other parts of the community especially in the Councilman's District in Council District 9. So those are the type of services we're providing. We're doing it proactively. We're working closely together. We're communicating and we're getting a job done.
Thank you. Are there any questions from members of the Committee? Chair recognizes Councilman Harrity.
Thank you for your service, man, as always. And like I said, you guys are always like that. I know Quetcy actually posts every time she calls and puts the day up there just so people can see that you guys are on it.
So I thank you for that. I have a couple questions. But just in general, when we say about fining them and all too, and Anthony was saying, like, thinking other stuff. I know out in the county if they catch you, they put your ass in the paper so that everybody knows that you got caught illegally dumping, you know what I mean. They do the same thing for DUI and small purchases if they catch you at Cottman or whatever. But just a thought, you know. I don't know what the legal -- we got the lawyer over here. I don't know what the legalities of that would be, but you know, maybe embarrass them a little bit on top of the fine. But have any cost- benefit analysis been conducted to determine whether the citywide twice-a-week trash collection would reduce costs related to illegal dumping in the long run? And I'm a fan of the two-week pickup. I hope yous come to my area soon. But just wondering if there was anything done because I believe that it would help us out and save us some money with having to clean up the illegal dumping if it's --
Right. So twice-a-week collections just started in December. We're actually gathering data now to look at the effectiveness of the program. We fully expect to expand that program to other parts of the city that probably has a greater need like your District. Councilmember Young and I talk frequently about the issues around Strawberry Mansion, Temple University and Kensington. Those areas desperately need it, and we're waiting on resources to expand that program because those areas are much larger and have greater challenges. And so, we want to make sure we're able to fully implement the program and know throughout that whole area. So we do expect to expand it. We are working with UPenn to look at a study to determine its effectiveness based on litter comparisons and litter indexes that we created in 2007 and 2008 using that same tool to determine the effectiveness of twice-a-week collection in communities and neighborhoods. We want to see reductions in the amount of waste that's being dumped on corners and rec centers and throughout. And so, we're going to use that. Afterwards we'll do a cost-benefit analysis to see how much it is costing us less to collect that type of material with separate crews.
Nice, nice. All right. And another thing that the Mayor had talked to during her campaign, would there be any benefit to providing some stronger trash bags to residents instead of, you know, she had said it, she caught it and it's the truth in neighborhoods where I live, for instance, sometimes it's harder to get to a store. We don't have any supermarkets so you can't just -and Home Depot is a few bus rides away for a senior. So they go to the corner store and they buy the trash bags that they sell there. But the problem is they're very cheaply made and you put the trash out and the first cat that comes down the street that bag's gone. I know she had -- I know it would be a cost. But she had mentioned about maybe supplying so many trash bags a month to certain areas of the city or through certain other qualifications let's say, I don't know how they would do that. Has any progress been made on that? Are they still thinking that way? I actually went and bought trash bags from a trash bag distributor and bought samples down to the Mayor's Office so that they could see the difference.
Absolutely, Councilmember. That is still a top priority for the Mayor. She's working with different organizations like Wawa, Giant, Home Depot and many other philanthropic communities who are going to help fund this initiative. We've recently provided them with some numbers and just try to establish the parameters of a program to distribute those 3 mil trash bags because you're absolutely correct, those small, tiny trash bags that people throw out trash sometimes rip open and they create litter conditions all over the city of Philadelphia, which is a big contribution to the problems that we're dealing with, how you place your trash out. Of course we would love people to have bins. I know Commissioner Shipman is looking at ways in which we can try to reinvigorate the bin distribution program --
But if you go out into the suburban communities and see where people have lids and trash cans, I mean their rules and regulations are certainly much stringent when it comes down to people being able to set things out of trash cans. But their neighborhoods are cleaner because they have to keep things with lids on top of them and ultimately, keep everything inside of a bin. Of course we would like that we do have some challenges in some neighborhoods where we have space capacity, which I talked about South Philly, some parts of Kensington. But overall, it is an effective tool to reduce the amount of litter and trash that's being generated each day. But residents can play their part as well, how you set out your trash. You talked about buying a stronger trash bag, but just not placing it out in any kind of loose litter way where our trash men have to clean up and pick it up, it will make a huge difference. And we have 10 points of ways in which residents can look on our website to evenly put out their curb waste at the curb, and some of them include of course making sure that you have sturdy, tight trash bags or place it out in the bin with a lid on it.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you so much for being here. It really is important. And I know you, the whole sanitation team that get millions of emails from our offices and it's great, we do react. The City is amazing in cleaning up. But again, the goal would be to stop people from doing this, right, so we could spend a lot of resources on cleaning up. You mentioned that you would like to get another 100 cameras?
Each year. So right now the total number you have is 100 or 300?
We have 300 up right now. We're putting another 100 up this year and each year we want to continue to expand that network. As I spoke with Commissioner Sue Slawson and Deputy Commissioner Sue Bucks, the parks are starting to be hit very hard with the dumping areas because of the locations that we have are now being closely monitored. So they go to other locations that are easy to access like our parks. You can get to Fairmount Park off of 76 or places off of 95 or the Roosevelt Boulevard and be in and out very quickly, and the only way to catch them is to have stricter enforcement. So one of the things we're looking to be able to expand is our camera network so that we can have wireless cameras in those locations that don't require fiber optics.
And I know you mentioned that a lot of people settle before it goes to court. What are the initial fines for somebody caught dumping?
And then they could call and make a deal before it goes to --
Then they call the Law Department and then discuss their situation, depending on the amount of dumping. Of course if it's severe and causing health and safety issues, there is no negotiation. But if someone dumps a mattress now, that used to be a $300 fine. That's now $5,000. They have to pay that or try to negotiate a settlement with Law somewhere around $2,000 in order to satisfy their judgment.
Because the goal is -- it cost the City a lot of money to go out there day-in and day-out. Some of them have front-end loaders that's needed on some of these dumpsites as much as people dump. And to recoup that cost of to the City, somebody has to pay it. It's all City taxpayer dollars that are going toward that. And I do believe that, you know, again the enforcement of it will curtail it. And hopefully you don't want to fine anybody, right. The goal is to eliminate the short dumping. But we know that if people do believe that it's cheaper to short-dump and you don't get caught than it is to go to a dump and pay for it to dump, they will find that alternative. So as we now progress through the 100th this year and hopefully 100 the next several years, Councilmember Young had asked about the criteria of putting cameras in there, what would be something we could do to offer certain locations that we see are constantly short-dumped that we turn in and you guys do a tremendous job of getting there and cleaning it up, but how can we get those added to your list of possible new implementation of cameras?
So those constant locations, you can forward it to our office where every month again the intergovernmental team, we look at those numbers and say these areas fit the criteria for expanded cameras. I think also it should be stated that some locations that we should look beyond the cameras and start to try to -- and I was speaking to my good friend Jerome Shabazz, who's here today as well, trying to transform those neighborhoods into vibrant, usable spaces like vacant lots, for example, and being able to make something -- I think about Hope Garden. I think that's in Councilmember Bass's District. Earlier this year PHS did a wonderful project called Love Where You Live where they actually transformed a vacant lot into a usable space where they give away organic food and have parties. That used to be a hot spot for illegal dumping and now it's not on our list anymore because now it's something that the community is taking care of. It is those type of investments that we need to partner and invest. Once we start to put cameras up and see the dumping cease, we need to start doing something with those open spaces. And being able to use the community to do so is a big help, and that's what our next major initiative for Clean and Green to do.
I think that's great. It's always important as we see more activation on those locations, there's more eyes and ears also on that location which helps as a deterrent for future dumping. But I really appreciate the efforts on this. I appreciate Councilmember Phillips continuing to drive this as a challenge for the city, but I know together we will hopefully be able to eradicate this short-dumping, at least to a sense where it is not a full-time 24/7 job for the City of Philadelphia to go there. And the resources spent, I would like to know maybe in the future maybe you can send to the Chair what is spent on cleaning up short-dumping and what that means to the City because it's a pretty big number I'm sure.
Sure. Sanitation alone spends over $2 million a year, and that doesn't include the enforcement costs and other aggregate costs that go into it. But Sanitation directly spends $2 million a year cleaning up illegally-dumped sites, 200,000 cut tires each year from locations, the ones that you see on this on the screen that we're addressing with Tookany Creek this year during the Philly Spring Cleanup. Those are the things that we constantly have to address and deal with the cost of the City taxpayer money that we should be redirecting into other things like vibrant, improved vacant lots.
Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Phillips.
Thank you. Thank you, Chair. I just want to echo as well that this Administration led by the Clean and Green Department, Carlton Williams, has been doing a great job with responding to cleaning. I will say that that's been amazing. You know, it's funny. When Carlton started, he was given a big ambitious plan and I think he's really did a great job of delivering it with Crystal Jacobs and a whole bunch of -- and all actually the people who work to do it. So thank you.
Yeah, seriously. And I think everyone notices it. (Applause.)
I guess now the next big step is to figure out how do we get you from just cleaning all the time. We've had neighbors call our office and I'll call up and say, Carlton, can you go clean this one. And, yeah, it'll be done in one day. They call again and say, it's dirty again. They were excited, and it's dirty again. And you just get, you know, this level of frustration and it's like, wow, we're impressed that you keep cleaning. But it's like the neighbors keep saying, it's nothing, why can't we just end it all together. And I'm thinking of now how do we help you take this work to another level where now we start, as Councilman Harrity said earlier, maybe we can start really publicizing who are the dumpers in the city and really putting a scarlet letter on them, you know. (Applause.)
I think that could be some sort of recommendation. Hey, I don't mind even posting on our social media page. We can help you in that capacity too to kind of let folks know don't do business with these individuals. The second thing Council President did say, I thought we had a law on the books that said that after a certain amount of times you can't do business in the city of Philadelphia having been caught for illegal dumping. I'm almost at a point now that we could do a five-month publicity thing letting people know if in five months if you're caught illegal dumping, just so you know you're no longer going to be able to do business in the city of Philadelphia. I don't know how long, but I think it's come to that point where it's just like you don't get a second chance. It's almost like a certain violent crime you don't get second chances for, and this is one of them. So I think that's something I'm thinking about. And the last question I have -- and this is a comment. I gave comments and here's my question: D.C., all the union people and all the workers, they've been doing a great job with helping with this initiative and I love it. I'm now thinking about how do we get them onto the prevention team whereas I'm, like, would they be excited with helping creating green spaces as opposed to they're used to cleaning? So now maybe we can get them trained and equipped to maybe take them from cleaning it up all the time to more like making a greener space. And then if that could solve a problem, because whatever money that we would give to always cleaning, maybe if they show there's a prevention that's happened, maybe that money can go back into their pockets as well, the workers' pockets because that could be helpful. And then lastly, anti- littering in schools. Are we doing any work to promote anti-littering mindsets in schools too?
Thank you, Councilmember Phillips. Really appreciate your support. First, to Councilmember Harrity and Councilmember Phillips, I fully support exposing people who illegally dump in our city. This is something that we would like to do. We have to work with our Law Department to make sure that we legally can get it done, which I think is the most important and the hurdle that we have to do it. But I agree 100% with you we should use this as a mechanism to let people know that we're very serious about illegal dumping in our city. And so, if there's a legal way for us to get that done, I am 100% in support of getting that done as quickly as possible and we would launch a campaign immediately to do so. The second regarding the business license, we should talk to our partners and Licenses and Inspections because there are legal ramifications for revocation. So we can have that discussion for those who commit crimes in the act of their business. I just think that we need to have that discussion with Licenses and Inspections first before we do so because I know that there are privacy laws and laws that they have. And while I agree with you, Councilmember, I'm all for shutting down their business. I just don't want a judge or anyone overturning the work that we put in. Finally, yes, we 100% also agree with training our young people to do more green infrastructure projects. And I was just talking to our Clean and Green people, along with Mr. Shabazz, with that $1.7 million grant to turn our vacant lots and the lotscapes where we're putting murals and green infrastructure and actually doing things like making those lots used for fun lots or fit areas or areas where people can just go relax and have it in combination with the community and having our young people for programs like Future Track, which is our program that we run in Sanitation, learn those skills to begin to do that green infrastructure work where they could take those skills elsewhere if they decide to work with the City, fine. If they decide to move and start their own business, we will be more than happy to do so. But that is the next steps in which Office of Clean and Green is heading, and we're happy to work with your office to continue that work.
Thank you. And I just want to say that the 9th District Office has made the most requests from the Council Districts, and it doesn't even compare to the fact that the requests probably would be higher, but I guess your team is getting to them before we are getting to them. So just want to say thank you. And then --
-- the hour, the cameras, right, if 11 we were to successfully get the 12 cameras, would it be possible we 13 can get some City jobs, maybe some 14 of your workers could turn from 15 cleaning maybe to actually 16 monitoring those cameras, you know, 17 like, on a 24-hour basis. How do 18 you get the 24-hour monitoring so 19 when you're like, wait a minute, 20 someone's coming, call the police 21 or get someone over there 22 immediately. So for the ones that 23 are more difficult to track because 24 they took off their license plates or they're hard to identify, we can get someone over there and catch them in the act and get them prosecuted?
Yeah, that's something that we could look at. We would have to extend the hours of operation for monitoring. We're happy to say that our Future Track members, some of them who have been funneled into those jobs as well from cleaning to now monitoring through our beautification circuit, so they can actually become enforcement officers or monitors in an effort to do that. So they transition from actually cleaning alleys, which they cleaned over 1500 alleys last year, to actually transitioning into now monitoring and playing a more active role in the enforcement part. But you're absolutely right, that's something that can be done.
Thank you, Councilmember. So you segued right into my next question. It was about Future Track and the opportunities that our young people in the city are presented with Future Track. So you just mentioned the 1500 alleyways that are cleaned through folks who participate in Future Track and you also mentioned opportunities once they finish that particular program. But can you expound upon what other opportunities are presented to them once they finish their Future Track program? And talk to us about how the Future Track program, you know, what's the benefits that's been for the City?
Yeah, the Future Track has been great. For the last decade, we've been able to offer people jobs and opportunities to be able to get gainful employment and leadership responsibilities, personal growth and development through this program and learning how to work very closely with our community neighbors to address. Thanks to OHR and our administration department, they were able to design tracks where once you meet the criteria for Future Track, meaning that you complete the program, you're put into a track where they could either work in Streets to learn surveys, to fill at the asphalt breakers, to fill potholes, they could work on a beautification track to continue the work of improving our neighborhood and green infrastructure projects that we talked about or monitoring and enforcement or they can actually go into one of our District residential cleaning programs if they want to continue. Last year, Councilmember Young, I'm pleased to report that we had over 136 people graduating out of 200. Thanks to City Council 136 people got jobs with the City of Philadelphia, full-time employment.
We want to continue to open up those avenues, not only in Sanitation but in other departments as well like Parks and Recreation, like the Water Department and so forth. So we're working closely with our partners to see where we can funnel them in the jobs because we know there's going to be a limit at some point for them to bring them into just Sanitation. So we need to look at other agencies and other opportunities. But it is working, and we're happy to continue those efforts as we lose the workforce into their well-respected rights to retirement and we have a ready-made workforce ready to step in and do the jobs of those people without any service interruption.
Thank you. Thank you for that. I think that's important. The service interruption, we want to try to mitigate that as much as possible. So allowing these young folks who are Philly residents the opportunity to gain some skills to get a City job that can be lifechanging, life-sustaining is something that we as a Council want to make sure that we keep investing in, because again those are Philadelphia residents getting Philadelphia jobs and we're going to support Philadelphia. So thank you for your leadership on Future Track. One more final question I have regarding the qualities of some of the illegal sites of the city, you know, vacant lots that aren't fenced, certain corners. Can you describe to us what can we do to reduce the number of sites? Based on just the physical location, the physical size of some of these lots and locations, what can we do to kind of mitigate some of these illegal dumpings that happen on some of these sites?
Yeah. I think a couple of things that are in place right now that we could expand, I want to acknowledge PHS and their LandCare Program and also CLIP, the Community Life Improvement Program, by going from six months to a year-round program. And thank you, City Council, for the support and funding for that. We're now able to continuously do maintenance of those areas and monitoring. I think that is very important because when you stop they get dumped on continuously, and it looks like the work that they've done previously goes for not. And so, what we needed to do was expand that program and now we're currently at 13,000 lots. We're looking at trying to expand to additional lots throughout the city of Philadelphia. I believe that there's nearly 40,000 lots. But we're going to work closely with our partners to continue to find ways to expand that. I talked about transforming our vacant lots in the usable space earlier. I think that is definitely a key way to go because that will not only help improve the area but prevent the dumping from continuously occurring in the first place. So when you transform those lots and turn it back over into the community to use, they help out in the monitoring. I mentioned Hope Park, that place does not get dumped on and it's monitored by residents and we haven't gotten any calls since last spring when they first opened up the program. I think those are important ways for us to get with residents within our local communities and neighborhoods. I know Ms. Bonita is testifying later, but we work very closely with Strawberry Mansion and that community to be able to transform many of those lots. And that's the direction that we're heading in next to figure out how we invest in those areas to make it usable space.
Thank you. So I do have one more question. When there's a demolition either done by L&I or whoever, is there an abatement plan for that lot in order to keep that lot from potentially becoming a dumping site? Is that something that we can work with L&I to come up with, because any new lot now could be a potential dumping ground for bad actors?
Yeah, I think that's something that we should have a conversation with Licenses and Inspections about. That would be great if we could figure out how to stabilize those lots while they're being torn down. Many of those vacant lots as a result of properties that no longer exist there. And so, they become open spaces and in places where there's a tremendous amount of industrial areas or old businesses, many of them in areas like Kensington or Philadelphia, they become hot spots for illegal dumping. So to be able to do anything proactively in the front end to prevent those open spaces just becoming unusable locations where it's easy to dump, then I think that would be very helpful. I want to acknowledge also the Streets Department for the Improved Street Lighting program, the goal to put out 100,000 LEDs. The lighting makes a huge difference as well so that people don't have dark, desolate locations to be able to sneak in, sneak out. When you have those well-lit places, that makes it very difficult for them to dump without being identified and caught. So those type of efforts and investments continuously need to be done.
Just real quick, in reference to the kids and getting them placed in other jobs after they're done their service, are we looking at maybe waiving the civil service for these kids, you know what I mean? Because we're short still almost in every 5, right, in every 4?
I would think that if we get a young person that wants a job or wants to, you know, that's a rarity too in itself. Young people they really don't want to work those kind of jobs anymore. So if we got them, maybe we need to try to find that pathway in the Sanitation, Rec, Streets Department for these kids.
Yeah. Well, that's the beauty of Future Track. They actually don't have to go through that civil service process. So their civil service process is that they have to complete the program. And if they complete the program within the year, they didn't put in the track that allows them to go through civil service without having to take an exam or wait on a list. I think that is the biggest challenge with civil service, is that you -especially in Sanitation, it's a lottery where you may or may not get high enough to get selected. So that's some of the challenges. But with this program, with Future Track which is the best part about it, we get a chance to evaluate the people that's in the program, so those who really do good and want a job can actually get a job and we get the higher quality employee. So I think it's a win-win situation for both of us through this program. They don't have to go through the arduous process of a test and hopefully get on a list somewhere, and we get a chance to monitor and evaluate our workers before they become civil service employees. And overall, it benefits the taxpayer because they're getting a high-quality person that works hard for the City of Philadelphia.
That's great. How many kids are in that program by each year?
Each year we, again thanks to Council, bring in 200 people in the program. And then based on how many people complete the program, graduation. They graduate and then ultimately they transition into a full-time job. So each year we serve about 200 people throughout the city of Philadelphia. Many of them come from recidivism. They come from our prison system. They come in directly to our program and then they go get full-time jobs. I know eight of the ones that I mentioned last year are now working full-time with the City of Philadelphia.
Well, that's exactly it. I think the way to keep somebody from recidivating is give them a job.
We want them back. We want them to be returning citizens. We want them to be citizens. I love it. Thank you.
And just for the record, once those folks complete the Future Track program, they're exempt from civil service but do they become -- I don't know if you can answer this question, but do they become members of D.C. 33?
Thank you. Any more questions for this witness? (No response.)
Seeing none, Mr. Williams, thank you for your testimony. Appreciate it.
All right. So as Chair, I want to take a little privilege we're going to do things a little bit differently today. I want to give members of the public the opportunity to come and share their perspectives on the City's response to illegal dumping and any other sanitation and cleanliness-related issues. So for those who've signed up for public comment, we're going to start that portion now just so you all can get your voices heard on the record and don't have to sit here for the remainder of this entire hearing if you choose not to. So, Mr. Pullin, could you please call the names of those who have signed up to give public comment.
Can we get Dallas Herbert, Diane Payne, Sharon Hiskell, Ramona Rousseau Reid. I'll try to call them up in four.
Yeah. If no one responds, you can call the next four I guess. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
So you can just state your name for the record and begin with your comment.
For the record, my name is Dallas Herbert. I live in Lawncrest, District 9. My Councilman is Anthony Phillips. And I want to thank Anthony for the time today for us to speak. I'd like to thank the Chairman Councilman Young and I'd like to thank the whole board, the whole Committee, for letting us talk. Okay. Like I said, my name is Dallas Herbert, and I am a member of 215 People's Alliance and I have lived in the Lawncrest neighborhood for over years. I 13 am a member of the Lawncrest Civic 14 Association and I am a member of 15 the Executive Board of the 16 Association. 17 Today, I also represent 18 the Trash Academy and 19 Tookany/Tacony-Frankford Watershed. 20 I have a story of fighting illegal 21 dumping going back to 2020. 22 There's not enough time to tell the 23 whole story, but I will tell you a 24 little about the 5600 block of Newtown Avenue, which we lovingly call Snake Road. We call it Snake Road because there is a bend in the middle which stops you from seeing the top of the hill and the dumpers can't seem to resist. I say lovingly because when the call goes out for cleaning, neighbors show up and we get the job done, if only for now because the dumpers will be back shortly we all know. There are no homes on the street, but there is an entrance to a beautiful green space, Tookany Creek Park, which the neighborhood does not have safe access to. 215 People's Alliance is currently in talks with our Councilman Anthony Phillips. And we hope with the help of the Council as a whole will allow the neighbors of Lawncrest to safely gain entrance to the park. Since we joined with the Trash Academy, we see it's not just our neighborhood being dumped on but the entire city as a whole. Well, almost whole because we know in some neighborhoods dumping does not happen or wouldn't be tolerated. It's mostly in the poor neighborhoods and neighborhoods of color. The Green and Clean and Safe Program the Mayor started at the beginning of the year is a lovely thing. We really appreciate it. We think one thing missing is enforcement to let the illegal dumpers know we won't stand for it. We need prevention in the form of education and small, low deposit places which would charge a cheaper fee instead of paying $100 or more a ton. Transparency is needed to let the citizens of Philadelphia know when, where and who has no 2 respect for their neighborhood. We do not accept that our neighborhood is a dumpsite for anyone's trash, and the measure is not how many times or how much you collect but how long the area stays clean. Thank you. (Applause.)
Thank you for your comment. So as one person finishes up, the next person can start their comment. Thank you. Appreciate it.
Hello. My name is Diane Payne. I've lived in Northeast Philadelphia 19111 for 40 years. I'm a member of 215 People's Alliance and we support the amazing work of the Trash Academy, Clean Philly Now. (Inaudible) has done to find solutions to Philly's ongoing trash crisis. Anthony Phillips is my City Council Rep. I thank you for this opportunity. In our part of the city, we have a legacy dumping site that is locally known as Snake Road. As a member of 215 PA, we have organized multiple cleanups on this stretch of road and advocated for cameras and better lighting. Although, we've had some limited improvements, these improvements point to what the Trash Academy Clean Philly Now and TTF is trying to change. Dumping here is not eliminated. It is simply a revolving cleanup site. We do see more cleanups in the area and that is of course welcome, but what we don't see is an actual change in dumping behavior. The goal for a truly greener and cleaner Philadelphia is to eliminate legacy dumping sites and not continuously use tax dollars to clean them up. As many speakers have noted and will note, a dirty Philadelphia impacts safety, physical health, mental health and the environment. What we need is a comprehensive long- term plan that includes prevention, abatement, education and enforcement. And I want to echo the crucial need for transparency in planning and goals and outcomes. Finally, being sure we are measuring what needs to be measured is important. It is great to measure the amount of trash removed, but it is even more important to measure the number of times we clean up sites over time with the goal to eliminate them completely. I would hope with all the work that the Trash Academy Clean Philly Now TTF is doing on cleaning and greening Philadelphia, that they will be at the planning table as this work moves forward. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. (Applause.)
I also thank you for the opportunity to shed light on a serious legacy of illegal dumping in my beloved neighborhood. My name is Ramona Rousseau Reid, and I've been a proud Eastwick resident for decades, living in the lower Southwest part of Philadelphia where I serve as a Block Captain, Chair of the Eastwick Watchful Eye Town Watch and Vice-president of the Eastwick Friends and Neighbors Coalition, EFNC and lead to the RCO for EFNC. As an environmental justice community organization, EFNC has witnessed firsthand the decades of environmental injustice our neighborhood has endured tracing back to the 1950s. When I was doing research on an unrelated matter to John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge in the archives I found and discovered photos from local community groups dating back to the '50s, pictures of residents protesting with signs pleading with the City to stop illegal dumping. It was shocking to realize that Eastwick has been fighting this same battle for generations. Because Eastwick is a heavily-wooded tree -- heavily wooded and with a number of trees, there are isolated blocks with little or no street lighting, and that's where people sneak in at night and sometimes brazenly in broad daylight to dump, in some cases the culprits or even our own neighbors who assume it's acceptable to leave yard waste like grass clippings, broken branches and vines in the wooded areas. Eastwick has also seen its fair share of stolen cars abandoned in these hidden spots. Determined to push back, EFNC resurrected the Eastwick Watchful Eye Town Watch that originated in the early '90s. This time we're not just watching. We're patrolling. We're determined to tackle illegal dumping and abandoned vehicles head-on. I am so grateful for Mayor Parker's Clean and Green initiatives, which have led to productive cleanups at our legacy dumping sites. Still the real key is prevention and enforcement. We need stricter prevention and enforcement and tougher penalties for violators, because all the hard work we do cleaning up is undermined when the trash inevitably returns. I've lost count of the times we've organized neighborhood cleanups, filling over 100 trash bags only to see everything trashed again a week later. It's frustrating to say the least. We've encountered everything from discarded furniture, a boat, burned-out cars, tires, construction debris, old washers and dryers and even a coffin was dropped off outside of the Pepper Middle School. These experiences make it clear that while community action is vital, it is not the solution. We need citywide collaboration, a real commitment to prevention and enforcement to break the cycle once and for all because our neighborhoods depend on it. In the words of a best- selling author and many other motivational speakers, we can't get something different without doing something different. I stand by that wholeheartedly, and I'm urging all of us, neighbors, officials and concerned community members to do something different so we can finally bring an end to this criminal decades-long injustice and preserve the beauty and safety and integrity of our communities for generations to come. A few years back one of our vigilant town watch patrollers, Leonard Stewart, noticed an old dumping site spot on a city-owned lot located at 81st and Lyons Avenue and Brunswick Avenue. This area was cluttered with all sorts of vehicles that didn't belong there, trash, abandoned trucks, trailers, campers and several illegally-parked cars. Well, naturally he reported this issue right away to and contacted Mark Jones who worked at Council President's office and as well as Angel Rodriguez numerous times. Well, the PRA office then posted a warning sign on the lot. This sign stated that all those vehicles would be towed by a certain deadline that same month. Unfortunately, that warning didn't lead to much action. None of the owners came to remove their vehicles and not a single one was towed.
And as of today, March 3, 2025, that city- owned property still looks like a makeshift junkyard. It's a complete eyesore and it remains a persistent nuisance in our community. In a nutshell, that space has turned into a space where people seem to stash unwanted vehicles with no repercussions. Thank you again for the opportunity to the Streets and Service Committee for the opportunity to speak. My zip code is 19153, and my Councilperson is Council President Kenyatta Johnson. )
Thank you for your testimony. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Harrity. I think he has a question.
I just wanted to get something straight while we got you here. I grew up in Southwest Philly so I know exactly where you're talking about. And I've actually reported it myself because one of my friends I grew up with lives right around there. What was that exact address again for the lot? And then what is the actual name of Snake Road?
Snake Road. The address is the 5600 block of Newtown, N-e-w-t-o-w-n --
And 81st Street and Brunswick Avenue, and that's the Eastwick Community.
Thank you all for your testimony. I really appreciate that.
Mr. Chair -- I mean, Mr. Pullin, please call the names of the next folks wishing to give public comment.
Sure. Can I get some hands raised when I call names just to see who's here. Siarhei Sarychau, Darya Valantsevich, Yvonne Stephens, Gloria Cartagena Hart, Melvin Powell, Joyce Brooks. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Thank you. Please state your name for the record and begin with your comment.
Yes. Hello. Thank you for your time. My name is Darya Valantsevich and I live in Brewerytown neighborhood with my husband Siarhei who couldn't be here today. We've called this community home for almost four years. I also have a small dog named Pretzel. Funny, right? Now, you might wonder what does a dog have to do with illegal dumping. Well, when we got Pretzel we started walking our neighborhood daily, and while the people in my community are incredible, the state of our streets are not. Every morning I wake up and ask myself, what will be on the corner today. Another 12 to 15 bags of trash, a discarded sofa, a mattress no one will pick up for three months. Sometimes it's worse. The first time I personally encountered illegal dumping I found at least boxes 5 of frozen chicken nuggets rotting 6 in the street. That moment stuck 7 with me, not just because of the 8 mess but because of what it 9 represents. It was blatant, 10 careless and completely ignored by 11 the system meant to address it. 12 Since then the problem has only 13 grown. 14 Illegal dumping in 15 Brewerytown North Philly and across the entire city is not just a problem. It's an epidemic. At first my husband and I tried to go through the proper channels. We submitted tickets through 311 expecting action, but the tickets were marked as closed without resolution almost every time the trash remained. Then funny enough, my 311 account was blocked because I was submitting too many tickets. Imagine that, instead of fixing the problem the City silenced the people calling attention to it. I have personally reached out multiple times to District representatives, the Streets Department and other officials only to be pushed around with no real action taken instead of solution. I got excuses, delays and fingerpointing. Meanwhile, the problem continues to grow and our neighborhoods continue to suffer. So our family decided to act. Like so many other families in Philadelphia, we spent our own money trying to fix a problem that shouldn't be fixed ours to fix. We rented a U-Haul with our own funds, paid out of pocket and cleaned up just one dumping site. But just in a few blocks we drove around, we collected more than bags of trash, eight tires and other debris, including mattresses that wouldn't even fit in the bags. Obviously, we thought we were making a difference. But when we arrived at the disposal center, we were met with hostility and resistance. The employees initially refused to take the trash, assuming we were a commercial business. After expanding multiple times that we were simply residents trying to clean up our own neighborhood, they finally agreed but only to a limited amount. Because of the city-imposed limits on waste disposal, they would only take certain amount of tires and bulk items per day. This meant we had to unload the trash at home and make multiple trips over the next few days properly disposing of everything. Instead of supporting our cleanup efforts, the system actively made it harder for us to do the right thing. And we're not alone. Families like mine are forced to contribute their own funds, paying for trucks, bags and disposal fees just to keep our neighborhoods clean. On top of what I mentioned, we also bought trash cans that we placed on one of the busy corners of the neighborhood with our own money and maintain it ourselves because we simply do not have other choices. Every week we use our own trash bags and clean the area around it, doing the work that should be the City's responsibility as well. We also purchased and placed Do not litter signs throughout the neighborhood hoping they would deter dumping. But signs alone won't solve this issue. We need action. Another major problem, like it was mentioned before here, is empty lots that are neglected and unmaintained. These lots attract illegal dumping, creating eyesores and health hazards and yet no one cleans them.
They become dumping grounds, everything from bulk waste and toxic materials and the longer they sit on unaddressed, the worse the problem becomes. Illegal dumping is a public crisis. This is not just about appearance. Illegal dumping brings safety issues that affects everyone, especially children. For example, we have a school nearby and I see kids walking past these dumping sites every day, rotting food, waste and toxic materials, tires, construction, debris, everything is there. S. have linked unsanitary conditions to increase crime and fire hazards. Waste that enters our water system breaks down, introducing pollutants like micro- plastics into our drinking water supply. These contaminants are extremely difficult to remove and pose long-term health crisis to residents. It's also a mental health crisis. Beyond physical health, the constant presence of trash affects our mental well- being. Walking outside and seeing dirty streets every day wears people down. It sends the message that no one cares, that our neighborhoods don't matter. It contributes to feeling of neglect and abandonment, making it harder to build pride and a sense of safety in our communities. You asked what can possibly contribute to the problem? I have a couple of examples that I witnessed myself: Certain conditions make our neighborhood a prime target. One of the biggest one is parked semi-trailers and trucks that create blind spots where people feel emboldened to dump without being seen. Empty lots that we mentioned, a lack of accessible, affordable waste disposal options that forces some residents to leave bulk trash on streets. No real enforcements means businesses and individuals dump in the same spot over and over again. City policies actually discourage this responsible waste disposal. A major contributor to the problem is lack of education and impactful public campaigns. Many residents do not fully understand how illegal dumping harms our communities or they believe it's someone else's responsibility. The City has failed to create strong, visible outreach efforts to instill pride, responsibility and accountability to maintaining clean neighborhoods. My ask is for the Council, we need real actionable solution. Enforcement and accountability is important. Strengthen fines and penalties for illegal dumpers. Install cameras and increase monitoring. Crack down on businesses and repeat offenders. Make accessible waste disposal. Expand neighborhood-based drop-off Sites. Provide free or low-cost bulk pick-up. Eliminate restrictive disposal limits and ensure 311 is a functional and responsive. The most important thing also is education and community engagement. Please help us launch visible anti-dumping campaigns and partner with schools and community groups to build environmental responsibility. Install and maintain trash cans in residential streets, not just business corridors with regular city collection. And finally, prevention and community investment is needed. Remove abandoned semi-trailers and enforce parking regulation to eliminate dumping hot spots. Address empty lots that remain unkept and fund the community-led cleanup efforts and support residents actively working to keep the neighborhoods clean. We want to work alongside you and we want to share our ideas, and stop forcing residents to pay out of pocket for services their tax dollars already fund. Philadelphia can no longer afford to ignore this crisis. The health, safety and dignity of our communities depend on full action. Will you commit to fixing this broken system? Thank you so much for your time. )
Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for having me testify. My name is Gloria Cartagena Hart. I am well-known as Smooches in the community. I am a long-term resident of 40-plus years in the Kensington area. I come to you as a resident as well as a nonprofit. My name is Gloria Cartagena Hart and I am here on behalf of Kensington Corridor Trust, KCT, for short, a nonprofit organization committed to fostering community-driven development in Kensington. As an organization focused on an important commercial corridor, illegal dumping impacts us in the small businesses we serve every day. Philadelphia disposes of nearly 1.4 million tons of trash. Yet despite efforts to clean and dispose of residential and commercial waste, including illegal dumping cases, the challenge persists overwhelmingly in Kensington. There's much to be said about trash, physical and emotional impacts on the body. Constantly seeing trash surrounding you is exhausting and discouraging spending time outside and walking in your community, essential factors for building relationships, supporting the small businesses on the Avenue and ensuring the neighborhood's safety and physical health. Seeing children and their guardians work to avoid mounds of trash on their commutes, and in our cases potentially impacted by syringes, also affects a person's emotional well-being. All these concerns play a role in a person's quality of life, and Kensington ranks last across all city neighborhoods. No community deserves to be disproportionately impacted by high rates of waste. Walking around the neighborhood is evident that the City's trash problem is complicated. While there have been various cleanup efforts along the commercial corridor in Kensington, we need to continue to drive additional efforts and solutions to address illegal dumping, which neighbors are no strangers to. For example, I share a personal story about vacant lots near my home. For example, on my block there were several vacant lots with significant illegal dumping challenges, which attracted pests, crime and varied concerns. This was a mission that I took head-on, rolling up my sleeves and working with neighbors to clean up, took head-on -- I'm sorry, in spaces to transform them into a thriving community garden it is today, currently the Butterfly Lot on Jasper and Somerset. The space is utilized for convenient block events, meetings and so much more. The same can be said about KCT Community Garden, which has transformed 11 previously vacant lots into a (inaudible) pollinator garden with small vegetables and garden beds. This garden provides an important third space for the community and supports potentially pollinator ecosystems. These are just two examples across the neighborhood, although there are various more informal cleanups and mitigation strategies that neighbors take on themselves. All this is to say that illegal dumping requires more than just trash pickups. While important as one strategy, true and long-lasting solutions require deep, intentional projects where communities (inaudible) that transform spaces into havens that don't attract illegal dumping and activities. We hope the City will support creating solutions that consider all these factors. Thank you in advance for supporting these efforts and taking the time to listen. Thank you. (Applause.)
Hi. My name is Melvin Powell III. The resolution today called for the Committee to review the City's response to illegal dumping and the development of effective tools to combat this issue. I'm here to offer my unique perspective on a policy solution that can help create a green, clean and sustainable community, but it starts with a challenge for the Council and the members presented here today. And that challenge is around prevention that was mentioned today. How do you prevent people from dumping? How do you re-establish trust with community members and citizens who have been involved in these areas? And through my experience it's really in creating a sense of ownership around these spaces, and that comes from the homeowners but also the people around it. I'm a proud Temple alumni and I've called North Philly home for the past years. As a 11 homeowner, I live in the 12 Brewerytown Sharswood neighborhood, 13 and I've watched the rapid 14 development of the area through my 15 work with the North Philly Peace Park and also the Brewerytown Garden. As a business owner and an entrepreneur, my career has specifically been focused as I'm a professional event planner, and I've been primarily focused on activating spaces and empowering entrepreneurs, creatives and small business owners who might not be present here today because they are actually working. To build community through special events: This started in 2018 when I ran a park in North Philadelphia called Sunflower Philly. It was a 1100 square foot real estate development that was previously a gas station. And so, when they took the tankers out of the ground, it left this giant hole. At the time I was throwing block parties, and we actually started gathering the community in this area. And I was hired by the developer to develop this project. Over the course of about four years, we hosted over 300 community events. We turned it into a nonprofit. And by the time going into 2020-2021, we had became an actual asset in the neighborhood. Real estate developers were starting to promote the park as part of the space for a lot of the development that was going on in the area. In 2020 specifically is when we started organizing community cleanups and we were challenged to do it once a month, and we actually were doing it weekly. We were working with local businesses. P. Mascaro to have a dumping site on the property that was still private at the time to be able to coordinate dumpings with individuals. In order to address the longstanding issue of illegal dumping, I believe that an effective strategy to ensure vacant lots remain clean once they have been cleaned is allowing the community temporary use of vacant land. As the Chair of the Vacant Land Committee with Circular Philadelphia, we released the policy guide last year in which we outlined four legislative recommendations and a pilot program to engage qualified community organizations and businesses in the temporary activation of vacant land. Currently, Philadelphia has over 40,000 properties, ranging from structures, empty lots and vacant land. But as we know, a majority of that, almost 75%, is privately owned. And so, we wanted to look specifically at the publicly-owned land that's owned by one of the four land-holding entities here in Philadelphia. We looked specifically at the 19121 and 19122 zip codes, mapped that against city data that was provided and we also cross- referenced that with data from the City Controller to really look at specifically in District 5 and District 7. We looked at where gun violence happened in 2023 and tried to find the closest publicly-owned lot within the five-block radius of that. We then mapped those projects and we started taking pictures. We started engaging some of the local community groups in order to start galvanizing the folks around it. Vacant properties have a direct impact on the morale of community, projecting a lack of hope and investment in an area's future.
Temporary intervention necessitates that property owners, residents, business owners and local institutions engage with one another in service of creating interim uses. So this can be everything from pop-ups to projects, community gardens and et cetera. The City already has a variety of different ways in which you all allow temporary activation of public land, short-term leases, special event permits, open streets, block parties, streetery licenses, garden agreements, are all examples of methods that have been implemented. So why is this important? Again, we aggregated some of that gun violence data and also looked at these vacant lands. So we would ask the Committee to review our policy guide and consider the following recommendations to implement temporary vacant land activation: Step would be to create an up-to-date inventory system of all publicly-owned vacant land that is not utilized by the local community or is being acquired through the Land Bank. Part 2 would be to create a checklist of every requirement a business or community group would need to comply with different uses, such as community spaces, outdoor dining or even circular materials management. Step 3 would be to create a simple, transparent and publicly accessible process and designate one office in city government that would process all temporary use request. And 4 would be to establish a monitoring mechanism to see if these short- term activations reduce illegal dumping and other crimes while also increasing community and economic development. Throughout my career, I've learned when you are able to actively engage individuals and businesses within the community and they feel a sense of ownership over a space, it can drastically reduce illegal dumping and improve morale. If the city were to show an openness for passing legislation that allows for temporary use, setting a clear basic framework of roles and responsibilities for organizations to get involved and provide clarity and certainty to these efforts that can inspire citizen engagement in the long-term planning and execution of projects that help reduce illegal dumping. So that's really been my big thing is when throughout these different projects, when they don't necessarily have to directly own the lot, but when they feel a sense of ownership over it, that is where you are able to prevent, you're starting to see more eyes on things, people want to get involved. People that move into the neighborhood are no longer seen as gentrifiers. They're seen as contributors and allies. And these are the things that I truly believe will prevent illegal dumping, dumping from happening and hopefully inspire these areas. So thank you for allowing me to testify today. )
Good afternoon, everyone. Councilmember Young, Councilmember -- good afternoon. My name is Joyce Brooks. I'm from the Nicetown community. I've lived in Nicetown for 57 years. I've raised my children there. Very nice when I moved there, but this is what I'm looking at now. So on behalf of the block captain -- and I'm the president of the Block Captain's Committee of Nicetown also. I sit on the Nicetown CDC Executive Board. So on behalf of the Block Captain's Committee of Nicetown and the Nicetown CDC, we want to express our full support of the Clean Philadelphia Now platform to end dumping by 2028. Nicetown and the surrounding neighborhoods have experienced significant illegal short-dumping issues for decades. This issue has resulted in hazardous environmental conditions and blight that have brought harm and a sense of futility with community attempts to rectify it. Our organizations have been working together to address the problems for years with little or no success. Our goal is to end dumping forever, and we know that that only can happen if we accomplish this together. Our coalition is community-driven and have proven to be effective in organizing, mobilizing and educating the community regarding illegal dumping and its efforts on our communities, which is also why we understand the importance of supporting this campaign to the end, to end dumping. We are urging the Council Streets and services Committee to ensure there's absolutely a plan and investment to prevention and enforcement -- I want to repeat that -- enforcement strategies, because without enforcement this will continue. We are part of PHS Love Where You Live, with PHS, Michael, and we do have our gardens and working with our children and our youth in our communities with the lots, but this short-dumping is really out of control. I just -- and to my own Councilperson Cindy Bass, I did send her an email this morning with a video that rodents, like a raccoon is running across my porch. We can't sit out. I'll be 80 years old next year. I want to come out my door and not be afraid that a possum would jump on me. This is running off of my porch in the morning. We have rodents, mice, all kinds of stuff because of this illegal dumping. Enforcement action to me is not taking place. We have people drive up in U-Haul trucks. We have people dumping in their cars, like when they cleaning out their house they will empty their trunks. And we also have neighbors that come out of Wingohocking Street in my -- I live in the 4500 block on 15th Street, and my stuff is on that board up there, you can see, Joyce Brooks, that they have a pole that is illegal to put, that the trash is growing like a tree every week. Our trash day is Wednesday. The trash truck be out there on Wednesday and they will bypass with shopping carts and dump the trash on the lot across the street at 15th and Wingohocking. We have a store across the street. It used to be the Spot Store. It's called now Nicetown Grocers. They have a dumpster on the side of their building which they have not emptied in years. We did send information to our Councilperson and different people. They did send Licenses and Inspections out. That was last summer, but nothing has been done since last summer. I'm just sitting here because I want to breathe. Our children in the community at Steel School have a 50% or 60% asthma. We have adults on my block, seniors, that never had asthma in life, but because of this environmental issue that's going on with this short-dumping. I'm begging and I'm pleading before I leave this earth that this will happen and that I come out my door and not watch or sit on my porch in the summer and I have to run in the house because raccoons are running down my block. This is unacceptable. I've lived there again for 57 years and this has to stop. Enforcement action is my piece today. Thank you very much. (Applause.)
Thank you, Ms. Brooks, for your testimony. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Harrity.
We hear what you're saying. If you get one of our numbers before you leave, the next time you're going to do a few cleanups in the community, if you contact us, we can make sure the trash trucks are out there. They'll come pick it up. We do it all the time. She knows we do it. Quetcy Lozada is always sending the truck over. They will actually come out when you're having your cleanup and you won't have to wait. It won't sit there for a day. You tell them what time you're going to be done and that truck will be there. So if you just get your Councilperson, District Councilperson, they'll respond like that after that. Jeffrey is good. You're actually --
Yeah. I can tell you that my office has organized that since I've got into office. So if you are organizing a community cleanup, we can ensure that, you know, to eliminate the issue with some of the sites with the bulk trash, we'll have the department come out to your corner to pick up the trash from those corners. So that's something that we can help organize so you can save money in your pocket so you don't have to do any of that kind of stuff. But I thank you all for your testimony today.
Mr. Pullin, please call the next person wishing to give public comment.
Bonita Cummings, Tosha Taylor, Ashley Tracy, Barbara Bloomfield. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Okay. Hello. My name is Ashley Tracy. I'm the Deputy Executive Director for the Pennsylvania Bipartisan Climate Initiative. I'm also a Fishtown resident. I am President of the Fishtown Neighbors Association. I'm going to keep it pretty brief. The City of Philadelphia has a constitutional obligation towards its citizens to provide a clean, livable environment under Article 1, Section 27 of the Pennsylvania Constitution. This amendment, known as the Environmental Rights Amendment, states the people have a right to clean air, pure water and to the preservation of the natural scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania's public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefits of all people. In case this is unclear, the Commonwealth it refers to is you; our municipal leaders and staff, elected and appointed. As I mentioned, I am President of the Fishtown Neighbors Association. Fishtown has been one of the neighborhoods to experience the highest generation of wealth in the last like to years. And if we're experiencing illegal dumping, then I know that my fellow Philadelphians and less economically-advantaged neighborhoods are having it much worse. Therefore, I urge you to examine the City's response to illegal dumping and develop more effective tools to battle this issue, which is both environmental and quality of life. Thank you for your time. (Applause.)
Good 20 afternoon, Councilmember Phillips and Committee members. Thank you for allowing me to present my testimony to you today. I am Barbara Bloomfield, a native born Philadelphian. I have been a committee person in the 9th Ward, and now I'm an Associate committee person. I am a constituent of Councilmember Cindy Bass. I live in Chestnut Hill, zip Code 19118. As a young person in the 1960s, I was involved in union, civil rights and civil liberties activities. From 1970 to 1980 I worked as a union organizer for District 1199C, the Hospital Workers union, and then worked as a hospital pharmacy technician for a few years. For many years I was interested in rocks, much more interesting than pills. And eventually I went back to Temple University and studied geology and received a Master's degree. With that qualification, I was hired by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection where I worked for years in the environmental cleanup section. I supervised remediation of contaminated groundwater at defunct industrial sites and operating gas stations. It is amazing how many homes in the counties around Philadelphia still have their own private drinking water wells and how many of those wells were impacted by dissolved contaminants from the old industries and by leaking underground storage tanks at gas stations. Public water supply wells were also affected. I learned a lot about how a government regulatory agency deals with environmental pollution. My work was part of the enforcement process. I thought of myself as half environmental cop and half environmental nurse. At a community meeting last year I met representatives of Clean Philly Now. I was inspired to support them because on a very practical level they are bringing together racial, economic and environmental justice issues that I care about. That is why I am here today. I have said a lot about myself, but I have nothing to say about illegal dumping in my neighborhood because it never happens. I live in Chestnut Hill in zip code 19118. It is in Councilmember Cindy Bass's 8th District, which covers the richest and poorest neighborhoods in Philadelphia. Chestnut Hill is the richest part of her District. Ms. Bass has often spoken at 9th Ward meetings about the issue of trash and illegal dumping in her District, but I don't think we ever got it because there is no illegal dumping in the 9th Ward in Chestnut Hill, none, ever. If there is no illegal dumping in Chestnut Hill, why should there be any in any other part of the city? We're all neighbors. We all live in Philadelphia. Chestnut Hill is a model of clean city streets and every neighborhood in our city should be the same. Thank you very much. (Applause.)
Thank you for your testimony. Please proceed with your testimony.
Testimony of Bonita Cummings, Director of Strawberry Mansion Community Concern and RCO. Council Hearing Resolution No. 240827, Committee on Streets and Services. Good day, Chairman and Committee members. And, Councilman Phillips, how are you? I first want to express my great gratitude to our Mayor Cherelle Parker, who has placed a major emphasis on quality-of-life issues for the entire city of Philadelphia, and it is working. So I want her to know that the citizens of this city, and particularly in Strawberry Mansion, are very appreciative of the risk she took to place that emphasis on quality-of-life issues. I have been an environmental activist in the Strawberry Mansion community since 1994, advocating for a 50-plus block area and supporting surrounding neighborhoods. My work has included tackling mounds of debris from vacant lots and street corners, launching the first Same Day Pay program from our own financial resources and pioneering initiatives like greening vacant lots, installing, fencing and more. We hand-rake lots that today are maintained with mechanical equipment, just some examples of our longstanding impact. My testimony today is a little different in that we have different types of concerns. So Resolution No. 240827 addresses the response to illegal dumping, focusing on monitoring high- activity areas, enforcement strategies and developing effective tools to combat this issue. However, I want to caution how we frame and understand this problem. The illegal dumping crisis in Philadelphia is not simply an accident. It has been weaponized to harm communities just as bullets do. This issue has been deliberately induced into our city and the urgency surrounding it is being used to justify policy changes that could negatively impact our sanitation workers, sanitation unions and the Streets Department. This conversation is far more complex than a simple short- dumping issue, and my experience tells me it requires deeper discussion than what can be covered in this hearing alone. Key concerns with my knowledge of debris and its harmful impact on physical and psychological health, I can tell you that, one, there is no such thing as small-hauler trash. What people want to classify as small-hauler trash should resemble a bathroom vanity, mirror or sofa and loveseat, items that be that can be collected curbside. However, small haulers are businesses and the actual trash they transport is far more dangerous, including toxic materials, excessive tonnage, unknown bacteria, mold, asbestos and other hazardous substances. Many Philadelphia constituents already suffer from asthma, sarcoidosis and other severe respiratory conditions. Permitting small-hauler trash at sanitation centers would expose our neighborhoods to harmful and toxic practices. Our sanitation centers and neighborhoods need to be protected. As we hear about private haulers, private haulers should not be collecting Philadelphia's trash. 5 billion budget, private haulers should not handle Philadelphia's trash collection. No matter how much funding they receive, it will never be enough. They will quickly deplete contingency funds and then come back asking for more, diverting resources from essential city services. This would undermine workforce development programs. Approving these changes would require canceling workforce development programs within the Streets Department. Under the leadership of Clean and Green Director Carlton Williams, Sanitation Commissioner Crystal Jacobs Shipman, Deputy Commissioner Keith Warren and Faruq Scott and Troy Cooper, the Streets Department has built one of the most dynamic Future Track programs for young men and women up to years old. 23 Programs like CLIP, 24 Community Life Improvement Program, led by Tom Conway and Jerry Eley have been instrumental in training and employing Philadelphians.
Both workforce development opportunities include high-functioning autistic individuals who otherwise would face unemployment, unstable street life and even fatal risk. A responsible path forward as this discussion shifts toward budget season, let's ensure that we are properly funding and enforcing what has already been legislated, including adequate public safety officers, sweep officers and trash enforcement, community educational waste management, protecting sanitation unions, preserving workforce development programs like Future Track and CLIP. Before handing City budget dollars to business owners, many of them who profit from gentrification, we must ensure that they are held accountable for the construction, debris and trash they create. The same developers now seeking City funds should first be responsible for cleaning their own construction waste, managing trash from their rental properties, preventing sprawling garbage cans and illegal dumping outside their developments. And knowing this conversation is being framed to push the City toward funding private interests rather than supporting our sanitation workers, City programs and community-led solutions, I urge this Committee to look beyond the surface and recognize the true impact of these decisions. We should not be competing with business industry with our city unions or our city employees. We should not be willing to hurt our young people, particularly high-functioning, our most vulnerable individuals in the city that can get jobs. We need to give our Mayor's initiatives, our clean and green economic opportunity for all, a chance to work. So I just wanted to express our concerns that may be a little different than the concerns expressed here today. I am available for further discussion or any questions you may have. Thank you for allowing me to share my voice today. )
Thank you all for your comment. Any questions from the Committee?
No, I don't have any questions. But I can tell you right now I'll never vote for privatizing sanitation.
Thank you all for your comment. Mr. Pullin, would you please call the next names to give public comment.
Sure thing. Please raise your hands as I call (inaudible). Cynthia Williams, Isabel Pilling, Michael Reid, Lili Razi, Danita Bates, Lorenzo P. Cannon, Madison Nardi, Yolanda Murray, Melissa Mann. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Thank you. Please state your name for the record and proceed with your public comment.
Good afternoon, City Council. Thank you for the opportunity to speak today. My name is Madison Nardi. I'm the Executive Director of 215 People's Alliance. We are a grassroots organization that builds political power to win issues impacting working class communities in Northeast and South Philadelphia. I'm here to talk today about the crisis of short-dumping in Philadelphia and the City's failure to invest in real solutions. Every year we spend millions cleaning up trash, $8.3 million in 2021 alone to remove over 7,000 tons from more than one 1300 sites. Yet the dumping does not stop. Cleaning up isn't a strategy. It's an expensive, endless cycle that wastes taxpayer money while our neighborhoods continue to suffer. We know what works: Prevention. Small hauler centers where independent contractors and residents can legally and affordably dispose of waste would dramatically reduce dumping. Investing in real waste management infrastructure would stop trash from ever hitting our streets, parks and vacant lots. But instead the City keeps throwing money at cleanup efforts after the fact, leaving our green spaces trashed, our air and water polluted and our communities to deal with the consequences. And while cameras may help with enforcement, we have to ask where are the cameras being placed and what does that mean for overpoliced communities? Dumping happens in the most poor neighborhoods and communities of color, areas that already face excessive overpolicing. These are the same places where cameras go up. Yet the dumping continues. We have three cameras on Snake Road, and yet every week there is still dumping. Cameras don't stop the problem. They just document it after the fact and we must think beyond cameras. We thank the Parker Administration for prioritizing cleanup efforts, but we need more than reaction. We need prevention. Instead of funding real preventative solutions, this Administration is pushing business tax cuts, draining the very revenue that we need to fix this crisis. We already know federal funds will shrink under Trump's government takeover. And now, City leadership wants to double down on trickle- down economics, the same failed policies that have never worked. Less revenue means fewer services, no money for prevention, no money for small hauler centers, no money to stop this problem at the source. We don't need prevention a decade from now when business executives decide the economy has caught up and the pennies have trickled down to our communities. We need it now. We need investment in small hauler centers now. We need policies that prevent dumping now, not another 10 years of cleanup contracts while our neighborhoods continue to deteriorate. Budget season is here and this City budget must include funding for small hauler centers to stop dumping once and for all. Philadelphia deserves better than lazy policies and corporate giveaways. If we want streets cleaned and thriving communities, we must fund prevention, not excuses. Thank you. (Applause.)
Thank you and good afternoon to our amazing city of Philadelphia. Go Birds.
Chair and Co-chair of this Committee, Councilmembers a part of this Committee and all neighbors in attendance, thank you. My name is Lorenzo P. Cannon-Umstead, and I currently serve as Northeast organizer for 215 People's Alliance. I'm also a Philly Future Track or former Philly Future Track participant. So my feet have been on the ground in response to a lot of these issues. I'm here today in support of Resolution 240827, in the support of the members of my organization and our entire coalition is Clean Philadelphia Now in the struggle to ensure dumping and to change the culture in the city of Philadelphia around trash and make our neighborhoods less vulnerable to the maladaptive behaviors of contractors, landlords and dumpers. Since there's no hard regulations against this decades- long culture, there has been a way in which we are taught to treat and exploit certain zip codes in the city, even if we live, work and extract profit from these zip codes. As Councilmember Ahmad referenced earlier this afternoon at the start of this hearing, we need to start to shift the culture around how we see where we live. Last time I checked the neighborhoods such as Rittenhouse Square, Society Hill and recently stated Chestnut Hill don't have these issues. So I hope y'all see where we're going with this. Lastly, I thank this Committee along with Councilmember Anthony Phillips of the 9th District for today. And I call on our own Mayor and Mr. Williams to keep chipping away at this issue as they've been attempting to, because I hear our plans and I know what our plans are and I hear their plans. But where can we meet to initiate this change in culture? Thank y'all. (Applause.)
Hi. Good afternoon. My name is not Lili Razi. I am reading her statement on her behalf.
Okay. She is -- wait a minute, no. I am speaking today as a proud resident of Philadelphia, zip code 19127 represented by Councilmember Curtis Jones, Jr. I am also an artist, community developer and someone who had has lived in Tehran, Iran, a city with the population of nearly 10 million and a metropolitan area exceeding 16 million. I bring a global perspective on public cleanliness and enforcement. Tehran, a city in a developing country faces many challenges in preserving its natural resources. Yet it demonstrates remarkable consistency in waste management. Trash is collected every night. Metro systems are kept clean, and street sweepers are respected as essential workers. The city's cleanliness model is our city is our home. This commitment fosters a sense of civic pride and care. In contrast, Philadelphia, a city with immense potential and resources, struggle with illegal dumping and visible trash. These issues not only diminish the city's beauty, but also send a disheartening message about how we value our shared spaces. As an international person who has chosen to call Philly home, I find it painful to see how this undermines the city's vibrant spirit and its residents quality of life. It was disheartening to learn through my involvement with the Budget office two years ago that Philadelphia's first impression from this perspective of others coming from New York and other cities is that Philadelphia is dirty. It's about creating a culture with clean streets and well-maintained public spaces, reflect our collective pride and accountability. By investing in effective enforcement, empowering public workers and strengthening the enforcement of dumping regulations, Philadelphia can redefine itself as a model of urban care. Even in a city within a developing country, consistent action and a shared sense of responsibility have proven transformative. I believe Philadelphia has the resources and creativity to do the same and become a cleaner, more vibrant city. Thank you, Committee Chair Jeffrey Young, Streets and Services Committee and Councilperson Anthony Phillips for the opportunity to speak. Together we can foster a city that reflects the resilience, pride and care of its people. Thank you. (Applause.)
Hello. My name is Melissa Mann. I have been a resident of Philadelphia since 2010. I have lived in four different neighborhoods, but only now in my current location which is zip code 19123 and I am experiencing illegal dumping and poor trash collection enforcement which both cause chronic litter and a worsening quality of life. I live in a condo complex with units. All 23 units put their trash and recycling out every week for regular municipal collection on the sidewalk in front of the property. That's units' worth 9 of trash in front of 3 townhomes. 10 Every week I witness trash and 11 recycling consistently put out 12 loose and not in proper containers, 13 such as stacks of pizza boxes, 14 paper bags of recycling with glass 15 bottles that blow over. There's 16 random junk, like recently a whole 17 toilet, construction debris and 18 nothing in bags. There are also 19 constantly loose poop bags, dog 20 poop bags everywhere. 21 Yet no tenant, 22 homeowner, HOA or property 23 management company is ever held accountable in an effective manner. I feel the need to testify because this is a prime example of illegal dumping, inadequate trash enforcement and city complacency happening right before your eyes. Unfortunately, after discovering the City regulation about six or fewer units in November of last year, I've been in touch with City Councilmembers. And only recently did I hear back from Crystal Jacobs Shipman, the Sanitation Commissioner, except Crystal Jacobs Shipman keeps stating she does not see a problem, and that the City rule about six or more units is "not cut and dry." Moreover, she has refused to explain in email what the criteria is to determine if a condo or apartment qualifies for the trash pickup exemption. Crystal Jacobs, the Sanitation Commissioner, will only explain this to me at an inperson site visit scheduled for Wednesday morning. So I call on the Mayor and City Council to hold the Sanitation Commissioner responsible for enforcing their own rules and pledge to eradicate the chronic litter and illegal dumping before the year 2028. If I didn't make that statement clear, there is a major problem because the City's regulations state, An inhabited private property is only eligible for city trash and recycling collection as long as it has six or fewer units. If I did the math right, units is nearly four 19 times the amount per property. 20 Thank you. 21 (Applause.) 22
Thank 23 you for your comment. I do have one question? Someone mentioned in their testimony that the City spends $8 million on illegal dumping cleanups. The Commissioner -- excuse me, Director Williams testified that the City spends $2 million. Would you tell us where you got your numbers from?
I don't have it in front of me, but I could email your office.
And the statistic was 8.3 million in 2021 so the numbers might have been different based on the year.
Thank you. Thank you so much for that. Mr. Pullin, would you please call the names of anyone else wishing to testify during public comment.
We have George Ambrose, Terrill Haigler. And that's it. It's only two.
Is there anyone else whose name has not been called wishing to testify On public comment, please come up as well.
Please come up if you're wishing to testify and your name hasn't been called. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Okay. Thank you. Please state your name for the record and begin with your public comment.
Sure. Good afternoon, members of Council, especially this Committee, for considering this ordinance. I am George Ambrose. I have been an employee and/or volunteer at Cobbs Creek Community Environmental Center in West Philadelphia since 2001. I have seen situations grow and deteriorate, but I'm here to urge you to invoke the passage of stronger anti-dumping legislation by Council. Clearly, more enforcement and stiffer penalties are needed. Unfortunately, parks and rec and parkland only second to vacant lots have become dumps, and we don't want dumps. Parks are not dumps. Parks are not dumps. Parks are not dumps. (Applause.)
Second, our center has been closed by Project Rebuild for two and a half years when it was supposed to be closed for nine months. We can't effectively serve our community when we're closed. As a result, a lot of dumping has occurred in our park, including our parking lot, during its closure. Please use your influence to get our center reopened. And I do want to offer a shout-out to our Councilperson Jamie Gauthier for her efforts and her involvement. And then finally, I want to thank the William Penn Foundation for its foresight in identifying illegal dumping or as we in Philly call it, short- dumping, as an area needed citywide addressing. We, along with the Philadelphia City Fund, the Philadelphia Water -- the Penn Water Center and the Tookany/Tacony Frankford-WaterShed are proud recipients of their grants to work on solving this urgent program. I talked to Jerome Shabazz from Overbrook Center. He and a couple of his partners are also members of this award. So we have a great team, a couple of teams working on this problem. And I thank the William Penn Foundation for their foresight. We look forward to working with Council and Parks & Rec on this project. Thank you again for letting me be heard.
Good afternoon. My name is Terrill Haigler. I'm more widely known as Ya Fav Trash Man here in Philadelphia. I'm here today just to give my two cents about prevention. As everyone stated all morning and all afternoon, we all know what reactionary is. We all know we can organize as many cleanups and pick up as many tons, but if we don't do anything towards prevention, it's going to be passed down from generation-to-generation as it was passed down to us. So my first idea, what I would like to make a statement on is that the Mayor had put something in her plan about having sanitation crews in every District, and I would love to see that expanded. Actually, in my nonprofit I have something called a litter Task Force, where I actually hire returning citizens and at-risk youth and I pay them an hourly wage to clean their own neighborhoods. And so far I've been doing it since December, and I have done a little bit of statistics. And the presence of people from their own neighborhood walking around, investing and cleaning up their own neighborhood cultivates that culture change that we're talking about. So I would love to see if we can get an expansion on having sanitation crews for each and every District. And companied with that, I think we should stop using 311 to report illegal dumping. I think with a Litter Task Force, the call should go directly to those sanitation workers or that Litter Task Force for that District so it can be dealt with in realtime. Statistics say that illegal dumping is dealt with between 10 and 90 days. When my guys get a call, we're able to do it in 72 hours. And my second suggestion is when it comes to education, I've been able to travel a little bit and talk to other sanitation departments around the country. Austin, Texas is one of the best I've ever seen do it. They have a 20-person Coms team for their Sanitation department. They send home literature, workbooks, information biweekly. They were able to teach the whole city of Austin how to compost just by sending pamphlets home and getting buy-in from everybody in the city. So now, they were able to add composting to the city's pickup program and they were able to reduce their contribution to the landfill by 35% in nine months just by sending -- I know the Commissioner said they have stuff on the website, but my grandmom's not going to the website. She's 80 years old. But if you send her a pamphlet home saying, this is how you properly put your trash out, this is how you do this, this is how you do that, I think that is a start towards prevention, educating everybody what do we recycle here in Philly. So many times people ask me is Styrofoam recycling. No, it's not if anybody didn't know. But I think that information going home from the city would be a great jumpstart on educating, and then all these other organizations here, 215, Stop Illegal Dumping Now, Circle of Philadelphia, you guys can collaborate and sending information home so that every resident is well aware of different organizations doing different things and now we're all moving together instead of silos. Thank you. (Applause.)
Thank you for your comment. Is there anyone else -- I'm sorry, any questions for the panel?
Is there anyone else in the chambers wishing to testify on public comment? Seeing none --
Hi. Good afternoon to everyone. My name is Dr. Monique Holland. I live in the Eastwick section. That's 19153. In regards to prevention, I'm a former educator, former teacher for the Philadelphia School District. I could remember back teaching the schools they used to have -- I don't know. I'm thinking about social media, using some of that to promote about making Philly clean and green. So I was thinking maybe in education I could remember us talking about no loitering. I just remember commercials and things like that being on T.V. So I think maybe bringing some of that back, that's another way of educating and using social media. The other thing is for the people that are that get caught for loitering, I was thinking maybe have them clean up in the area where they're dumping is another thing. I know you were talking about maybe putting them in the newspaper. But I thought if they get caught even if they pay that fine, they should come to the neighborhood where they've added the trash to and maybe have them clean up. That's the only thing I wanted to add, so thank you. (Applause.)
Thank you so much for your comment. Is there anyone else wishing to testify during the public comment period? (No response.)
Seeing none, Mr. Pullin, would you please call the names of witnesses to testify for the next panel.
The next witnesses to testify are Ashley Miscevich and Will Carter, Manager of Local Government Advocacy and Vice-President of Government Advocacy and Engagement for the Chamber of Commerce of Greater Philadelphia. Also have Matt Rader and Keith Green, President and Vice-President of Healthy Neighborhoods of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, and Nick Esposito, Board Member of Circular Philadelphia. Thank you so much. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Thank you so much. Can you please state your name for the record. We do note that we do have your written testimony. So if you are able to summarize, that would be great. And please state your name and begin to proceed with your testimony.
Hi. I'm Matt Rader, the President of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. Keith Green is not with us. He's dealing with a health issue, but he sends his regards. PHS is a nonprofit based in Philadelphia. I'm a Philadelphia resident. We use horticulture to advance health and well-being of Philadelphians by creating job and business opportunities, creating high- quality, safe, pleasant neighborhood environments and also connecting people and helping to grow food. We do this citywide. We do receive City funding, as you know, primarily for cleaning and greening vacant lots. We also nearly double that money with other resources, including proceeds of the flower show that's underway right now. We agree that illegal dumping is a significant and pervasive threat across the city, and we believe that our land care partnership with the City and community residents, businesses and nonprofits is a really effective tool to address this. And I think just listening to the testimony, it's important to realize that consistent cleanup is actually a form of prevention, right. Consistently cleaning reaches a place where the dumping no longer happens. Unmanaged lots become hot spots for illegal dumping, litter and criminal activity, and these contribute to neighborhood decline, health challenges and increased stress has been noted. We systematically clean, green and transform vacant lots into community assets, working with residents, community organizations and small businesses, leading to proven outcomes like reducing gun violence, lowering stress levels for neighbors and improving overall community well-being; and all of that's been documented by research that you have seen and is noted in the memo. We've also designed this work that is done through small businesses and community organizations, 70% of which are minority or women-owned or led, which in turn create 300 jobs for neighborhood residents, many of whom go through our workforce development training and get access to a stable job. So collectively, this transforms the dumping situation and vacant lots but also transforms the economic and safety outcomes of a neighborhood. As has been noted, Mayor Parker's Administration with City Council support has done great work in the space in recent years, including scaling up vacant lot cleaning and greening in commercial corridors and expanding the maintenance from eight months a year to year-round. This is transformational. And then I'll just offer a few recommendations on what can be done next to amplify these impacts: The first is you're coming up to a budget cycle and it's important to renew existing support for the LandCare Program, including the recent expansions in commercial corridors and year-round maintenance as well as allowing reasonable increases for annual increase in wages and contractor payments. Renewing that funding is key not to lose ground on this issue. The second is really committing to moving all eligible vacant land in Philadelphia into land care or similar programs and partner with us and others on a multi-year plan to make sure that all the vacant land in the city is proactively managed. That's that maintenance is deterrence, right. At this point, vacant lots not in the LandCare Program can be cleaned up as-needed by CLIP but are not in any kind of consistent maintenance, and that means the problem recurs. The third is also to consider expansion of Land Care and similar treatments to other public lands like park edges that experience frequent illegal dumping. There's no reason it only needs to be traditional residential or commercial sites, but that's a decision for the City. The third -- next is considering increasing the number of maintenance visits per month to land care sites, experiencing the most frequent illegal dumping. Currently, we do one or two visits a month and it's just a matter of funding to scale those up if there's a need to get to that point of successful deterrence.
We also agree that strengthening enforcement and accountability measures for violators who illegally dump is critical and we need support like inspector services to follow up with perpetrators and issue citations for illegal dumping. We also need to empower inspectors to stop active construction work and pull licenses from contractors who illegally dump. That will interrupt the issue. Because contractors often illegally dump construction debris on green lots to avoid disposal fees, explore partnerships with waste disposal companies to provide low-cost, accessible, legal disposal options for contractors, basically making sure that there's an option for businesses to do it right, which would help reduce the incentive to dump illegally. And then finally, develop stronger community partnerships such as neighborhood watch programs to help monitor vacant lots and report illegal dumping in realtime. I'll leave the rest unsaid. You have it in writing. We're really proud to work with the City, and we believe there's a lot of potential to continue to advance this, both for addressing the dumping issue and creating economic and safety outcomes in our city. Thank you.
Hi there. Ashley Miscevich, Manager of Local Government Advocacy at the Chamber of Commerce for Greater Philadelphia. Thank you, Chairman Young, Councilman Harrity and Councilman Phillips, particularly for introducing this resolution. The Chamber is proud to be here today to testify on this issue. The Chamber represents businesses across 11 counties and nearly 600,000 employees in the tristate area. The Chamber's vision for the Greater Philadelphia region is to be a top global destination for business and a leader in inclusive growth. We recognize that a strong business environment is directly tied to the City's quality of life, which is why we're here to support solutions that create a cleaner, more prosperous Philadelphia. A recent survey of our members found that 80% are dissatisfied with the cleanliness of our city. Second only to concerns about crime and the cost of doing business, illegal dumping devalues properties, deters investment and weakens our commercial corridors. Further, as Philadelphia prepares to host a major global event, now is the time to take meaningful action and we know solutions exist, many of which have been amplified here today. Continued investment in smart technology such as AI-powered surveillance cameras and litter mapping will improve tracking, enforcement and resource allocation. Expanding bulk disposal services will help reduce the backlog and provide accessible legal disposal options for residents and businesses. Programs like PHL Taking Care of Business, CLIP, the LandCare Program and the City's Office of Clean and Green Initiatives have already made an impact and ensuring proper support for these efforts is critical. These programs play a critical role in keeping commercial corridors clean, stabilizing vacant lots and enhancing enforcement. Additionally, by leveraging partnerships with organizations already working in this space, the City can extend its reach into all neighborhoods and communities, empower individuals to take action and develop long-term sustainable solutions to keep our city clean and thriving. Our written testimony further details the impact and opportunity of addressing this issue, but the Chamber is committed to being a partner in these efforts. A cleaner city attracts investments, fosters economic growth and enhances the quality of life for all Philadelphians. We urge the City to prioritize proven solutions to ensure Philadelphia remains a top destination for business and tourism. And I thank you for your time today.
Thank you so much for your testimony. I do have a question for Mr. Rader. Is it correct that you guys facilitate this Same Day Work and Pay program?
We have one of the Same Day Work and Pay programs, so we have one that works with CDCs and neighborhood organizations to pay people to work for a day doing cleanup. There are others that are funded by the City as well.
Thank you. I just wanted to make a note of that because my office, when we do have these community cleanups that are organized by community members, we tend to look for groups that have the Same Day Work and Pay contracts to enhance the level of cleanups that we do in the communities, but also paying people who are from those communities to participate in these cleanups as well. So I just want to say that's a great program. And hopefully throughout this budget cycle, we can look to enhance some of those programs. Because again, we're putting money in people's pockets on that day that they're doing a service to our community. So definitely look forward to having more conversations with you about that program.
Thank you, Mr. Rader, for your testimony. Also, thank you, Ashley, from the Chamber as well. Mr. Rader, just for some clarity. You noted that one of your recommendations from the Horticulture Society is that because contractors often illegally dump, how do we find ways to incentivize them to lower fees for contractors to do the dumping. Do you think that -- are there examples from other cities that show that if you incentivize them in this way by lowering the cost of dumping that they would actually do it? Have you seen this done before anywhere else?
I don't have that evidence. I will say take the recommendations as a whole. So I think we even heard from residents today that they collected trash, and in that case took it to a City center and got turned away because it was too much. So there are small businesses that dump because it's the easiest option. And I think a combination of robust enforcement as we advocated and making sure that there are good options together could help a small business that wishes to do right find a better path. I'm not a Pollyanna. I think it's going to take enforcement, and we also advocated for stopping active work where a contractor has illegally dumped.
Okay. Thank you. And the next question I just have for you is about the lot program. You mentioned this thoroughly throughout your testimony, which I think is great that you all continue to do this. Is there a way in which you can see a greater partnership with the Sanitation Department to help you with greening these lots and making them spaces where -- is this something that has been explored or talked about because maybe that could become more of a budget item about taking these lots into spaces that become productive and that is connected with your organization as well?
I believe so. I think we have a nice partnership today with Carlton and Tom Conway at CLIP. And I think CLIP and LandCare are complementary services, where CLIP gets you rapid response as you have noted and cleans lots. LandCare then puts it in stable maintenance for the long haul, and I think leaning into both of those services is really important. We have more vacant land in the city that can ever be fully activated. So LandCare should be thought of to me as a baseline treatment to make sure every piece of vacant land is clean and green for community benefit and available for use. But I do believe that there's possibilities through temporary permitting and some of the other topics raised today for businesses and residents to make more use of these lots, and I would love to explore that with you.
Thank you. And my last question is for Ashley from the Chamber of Commerce. You mentioned that the business association is, you know, not business association, the Chamber of Commerce, the businesses that are within the Chamber, are very interested in ending illegal dumping. Is there a way -- and I also read your testimony that there's several examples across other cities that have led campaigns on it, so thank you. But is there a way in which the businesses that you represent, that they can team up with the City maybe with a camera program or some sort where they're submitting the angles of where the dumping is happening around their surrounding commercial corridor or businesses so that we can quickly identify these individuals and help them with that?
Absolutely. One, I think that that's something that we could communicate to our members and try and find ways that we can leverage cameras that they have. I know the City also offers a business security camera program and understand that they can have the police department tap into those. So maybe there's a way that we could leverage those tools that are already there, but I'd be happy to have further discussions around that and seeing how we can bring our members to the table to help to address not just the issue but help with enforcement that the City is trying to tackle, so absolutely.
Well, thank you for your testimony for the viewing public who's been listening today. We appreciate you. Thank you, Chairman.
Thank you, Councilmember. Are there any other questions for these witnesses? (No response.)
Seeing none, thank you again for your testimony. Appreciate your patience here today. Mr. Pullin, would you please call the names of the next panel to testify.
The next witnesses to testify are Maurice Simpson, Eastern Pennsylvania, Director of Clean Water Action; Allen Burns, owner of R.S. Burns Company, Inc.; and Aminata Sandra Calhoun of Parkside CDC. (Applause.) (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Good afternoon. Thank you for being here today. Please state your name for the record and begin with your testimony. We do have your written testimony that is submitted for the record as well.
My name is Maurice Sampson. I live at 129 West Gorgas Lane in Mount Airy. My Councilwoman is Councilwoman Bass, and I am also the Eastern Pennsylvania Director for Clean Water Action. I want to thank you, Councilmember Young. This is our first time that we've met. I've been coming to this Hall for 50 years and it's good to meet you. And also to -- there he is, Councilmember Phillips, who keeps calling me every time there is an issue that needs to be dealt with. Thank you so much for that and thank you for introducing this hearing. I want to offer comments today on Mayor Cherelle Parker's Clean and Green Initiative and recommendation on how we can end dumping in Philadelphia. Now, I'm offering these comments. I want to make sure it's clear that I'm an established solid waste management professional. I've been involved in the industry for some 34 years, predating my position with Clean Water Action. I was honored to serve the City of Philadelphia as its first Recycling Coordinator. Was appointed by Mayor Wilson Goode in 1985. I've also provided professional services, assisting in startup and recycling programs in major cities across the country in the 1990s, and advised commercial recycling at the University of Pennsylvania for more than years 4 and several architects and design 5 and construction of waste recovery 6 systems for five student apartment 7 buildings that are now standing on 8 Temple University and the 9 University of Pennsylvania. I'm 10 also the longest-serving member for the Streets Department Solid Waste and Advisory Committee. I was appointed by Mayor Ed Rendell in 1994. I want to praise Mayor Cherelle Parker's Clean and Green Initiative, its Director Carlton Williams and the Streets Department personnel in their unprecedented effort to in part clean up 40,060 blocks in commercial corridors in the Mayor's first year in office. Commercial corridors free of litter is good for business, and clearing illegal dumps improves the quality of life in neighborhoods that have suffered for decades. This is important after years of promises, and I have heard them personally about what's going to get cleaned up. Mayor Parker has delivered. She's making it happen. And that's to be -- she's to be thanked for that. Praises aside, we can do better. Picking up trash does not make it green. What makes it green is not picking it up. It's how you put it down. Burning or landfilling trash is terrible for the environment. Burning trash poisons Black people and Brown people in Chester and landfill poisons primarily White people in rural Pennsylvania. It is only green, what is picked up is destined for reuse, recovery or recycling, and that is not happening. We need to clean our corridors, but cleaning and abatement alone is not enough. An effective program combines four elements: Prevention, abatement, enforcement and education. Clean Water Action in partnership with the Trash Academy launched a Clean Philadelphia Now Campaign in March of 2022 as an alliance to link the actions of those involved in cleanup campaigns, identifying open dumping and demanding better waste collection practices to keep our neighborhoods and the city clean. Between July and December of 2022, we held a seven- part online teaching to become experts on illegal dumping and what is to be done about it. The Clean Philadelphia Now platform summarizes our findings and recommendations to end illegal dumping forever by 2028. For the record and your consideration, that platform is attached to my comments which I have submitted for distribution to the Committee. The platform offers a series of actions in the four categories: Prevention, policies and practices to stop dumping before it occurs. Abatement, to clean up after dumping has occurred. Enforcement, to those who litter and hold dumpers accountable. Education Outreach, a long term initiative to address behavior and systemic issues.
These are necessary components for a comprehensive strategy to end dumping in Philadelphia. Many of the details have already been presented by some who have spoken and will yet speak after me so I'm not going to get into all of now. But in conclusion, I want to offer you several points and a challenge on behalf of the Clean Philadelphia Now Coalition Clean Water Action, members of my organization. Dumping happens because we tolerate it. Without prevention, enforcement, the clean but not so green initiative conveys that dumping must be managed because it cannot be ended. Neighborhoods with designated cleanup days will host permanent dumpsites. Neighborhood leaders who are currently unable to seek cleanup when they call for the City can be assured that once they have this designation, they will have regular cleanup as a function of the initiative. And I absolutely assure you none of those programs are going to be in Mount Airy or Chestnut Hill. As an effective prevention enforcement program would drive illegal dumpers to private-run operations like Richard S. Burns Company that recover, recycle and reuse most of the material they receive. And Mr. Burns couldn't be here today but when I finish my comments, I have his comments to read. On our present course that facility will be unable to compete with the convenient free dumping services allowed by the City, forcing the layoff of the 200-plus workers that they employ. A comprehensive and strategic prevention enforcement program would dramatically reduce the City's cost for cleanup and create private-sector jobs that are also tax assessment -- assessment -- assessed for the city. I challenge every member of the City Council to declare a zero tolerance for dumping to adopt the Clean Philadelphia Now Program and insist that the Mayor enhance the Clean and Green initiative with an aggressive program of prevention and enforcement that supports recycling over disposal. I challenge each of you to support the mission of our coalition and fight dirty by refusing to approve a budget for the Clean and Green initiative in the coming fiscal year unless it includes line items that fund a definitive and aggressive program, prevention and enforcement and recycling, a program that delivers, not studies or campaigns with posters and slogans. City Council has the power of the purse. You're the most powerful entity in here. We need to make sure that we have programs that aren't going to just clean, because cleaning is important. Cleaning and maintenance litter is one thing. We've got to deal with that, but dumping is something we should not be accepting as a reality and we need to make it a mission to end it. I want to end by making just three last points: First, the current provisions of The Philadelphia Code are adequate to support a low-cost enforcement program. Please don't waste time rewriting them. They need to be enacted, not rewritten them. Why do I say this? I've been coming here for years and every time we have one of these hearings, they rewrite the laws and then they figure they consider it as done. Please we have what we need. It's on the books. Let's just enact what's already there. Second, this hearing on illegal dumping was overdue and you've gotten an earful already, and there's a little bit more to come. Honestly, the experts about illegal dumping are I think people have been living with it and you're hearing from them today. I have not addressed what I consider to be the reckless, expensive and unnecessary plan for twice-a-week trash collection for the whole city. Yes, we do need it in some parts of this city. There are homes that were built for families of one that have families of five. They don't have a backyard. They don't have a front yard. They're not going to live in their apartments with trash. So where does it appear? Nicely piled against trash cans. There are some areas of the city that need it. I don't need it in Mount Airy. I've got plenty of space.
I can buy an extra can. Don't waste your money coming out to see me twice. It does mean I'm going to have more litter because one of the biggest causes of litter are trash trucks. So you're going to increase my litter and give me service that I don't need. So please -- and I'm sure I could talk to my neighbors. Cindy isn't here. I'll make sure that we don't complain that we don't have it if everybody else does. We do not need twice-a-week collection in Mount Airy. Finally, Philadelphia is the only large city in America, the only large city in America with the recycling rate that has gone down. We have gone from 20% down to 13%. The Street Department doesn't project adding composting for at least years. But that declaration, that effectively abandons any thought that we're going to have zero waste by 2035. We don't have a policy for recycling in the city of Philadelphia. That subject also needs a hearing to talk about why that is. A well-managed waste collection program directs material towards recycling, towards composting and towards disposal. If you do it right, very little to dispose, most to go in the other direction. That is one waste program that is not the way we think about it in this city, and that is something that we need to explore for at least the fifth time since I have been here, but that is since I've been here in the city. After 30 years and four Mayors in Philadelphia, it's really clear to me nothing will change about waste management Philadelphia without a clear strategy and the absolute support of the Mayor. Mayor Parker is about cleaning up, and thank goodness for that. We're doing that. There is more to be done. Thank you again for this hearing, but let's commit to zero tolerance for illegal dumping. Let's fight dirty together and let's end dumping forever by 2028. And we can do it if we decide that that's what we need to do. Thank you for that. If you'll give me a second, I'll just read the statement here that I was given from Mr. Burns.
So that will be noted for the record. We do have testimony from Mr. Allen T. Burns, President of Richard S. Burns Company, Inc.
Okay. Then let me say this. He has offered to have you come out and look at his facility, his remarkable operation. His father was on the First Advisory Committee under Wilson Goode. He had two trucks. He now has his whole family in the business. He's retired. He's got 200 people hired and he recycles about 80% of what comes in. It's the same exact material that you see being dumped. He recovers it all. So I'd like the opportunity to set up a tour so you can come out and see this as Council, because you can see how it's done and it employs people. Thank you.
Good afternoon to you City Council and thank you for being here and receiving us. And I want to say I thank you City Councilmembers who are steadfast this afternoon in giving me the opportunity to speak to you. My name is San -- my name is Aminata Sandra Calhoun. I am the Director of Centennial Parkside CDC, Sanitation and Environmental Programming. I've been hired there since January of 2021 and Jamie Gauthier is my City Councilperson for the East Parkside Section. Not to tarry you any further, I want to share with you in my position as Director of Sanitation and Environmental Programming with Centennial Parkside, I had the privy Monday through Friday to collect trash, debris and illegal dumping. So what I want to share with you is my record for 2023 to 2024, my account of illegal dumping in the East Parkside Section of Philadelphia. 73% of construction and contractor dumping, 51% to 55% of sheet rock, and we are only talking about East Parkside. 20% plaster, 35% gallon pails of that joint compound, 15% of liquids. 57 phone call reports to 311 from me in reference to the illegal dumping. Year 2024, undeniable increase of illegal dumping. 87% to 90% of construction and contractor dumping materials illegally dumped, 78% of sheetrock, 40% of plaster, 48% of gallon pails of joint compound and 25% of liquids in the East Parkside Section. I need zero illegal dumping in East Parkside, and not just in East Parkside but throughout the Philadelphia community. Now, I want to share with you as I leave City Council this afternoon, what I am going home to on a state highway on Belmont Avenue across the street from my physical living condition. This is a residential home. I have been contending with this since 2019. And this is what I'm going home to and this is what I leave out -- this is what I leave out of my front door with every day. I have now developed living here in Philadelphia with the trash, litter and illegal dumping, environmental distraught, distress, EDD, and I need to get healed. (Applause.)
Thank you for your comments and testimony. I do have a question for Ms. Calhoun, particularly regarding the picture that you just showed us. For me it looks like that no 6 one should have to live like that or see that on a regular basis. So I just want to encourage you to continue to work with your City Councilmember because that looks like someone obviously with a mental health issue in order to hoard trash like that, right. We have to look at all aspects of this, right. And again, we have to look at what creates these types of environments. And so, we must make sure that our neighbors, one, are educated but to have the help that they need in order to sustain a life and to be a good neighbor, right. A lot of folks don't even understand what it is to be a good neighbor. So I encourage you to keep doing what you're doing and working with all stakeholders to make sure that folks receive the resources they need in order to improve the quality of life for your neighborhood. I want to thank you for your job that you're doing at the nonprofit CDC.
And, Councilman Young, may I say I have consistently, constantly and daily entered into all of the systems with this situation as late as last week. Even I understand that this individual may definitely be clinically diagnosed hoarder, but should I in the community be subjected to this? I mean, I am fed up and I want to leave Philadelphia because I cannot continue to live like this. It's a state highway. Belmont Avenue is a state highway. And in reference to he may be ill, well, he's making me more ill. And I need to know that this needs to be resolved like yesterday. And although this may be -- I mean, I have taken this to every system in the Philadelphia system, L&I and everybody and it has to halt. We're getting ready to come into spring, summer. The maggots be running all around the pavement and the flies you see literally the rodents, the mice and whatnot coming out of this. He has now resorted to putting the trash bags, which I have spoken with Carlton Williams, which is not his fault and his purview, and I've reported to 311 and sent pictures, that now he's putting the trash bags on the third floor roof. You can visually walk down the street and see at least 15 to 20 trash bags on his third floor roof. And I called the Fire Department. I said, this is a safety hazard. From the weight of the trash bags you can see visually the roof is beginning to go down and it's a safety hazard to the other homes around. Because if that trash should catch a fire, roofs are old wood and dried wood, that's going to create a massive neighborhood fire. I'm tired of this. I am 76 years old and I refuse to live like this. And no 15 poo-poo on the young lady who expressed she's 86 and coming out her door to possums. I ain't doing that. I'm leaving Philadelphia because this is beyond living in a funk dump third world. I'm done.
Thank you for that again. Thank you for your work that you continue to do in your neighborhood to improve your neighborhood. Chair recognizes Councilmember Phillips.
I just want to quickly applaud Maurice. He's one of the major reasons why we're doing this hearing today. And I just want to say thank you for that. And also, this zero tolerance when dumping I couldn't agree more. You provided some really great insight into the twice a week, yeah, because even in some neighborhoods I represent I think about the fact that they may not need it because we do have a lot of land and so forth to do that. So how can we put more of our funding into the prevention mechanism. So, Maurice, I just have a question for you around, I know you have in the report, just quickly is there maybe one top recommendation that you can provide us that will end illegal dumping here in the city of Philadelphia, that's in that report so we can add that on record?
Well, I'm not going to steal Shari Hersh's thunder because she's going to handle that when she speaks. But really we need to seriously look at this idea of providing the opportunity to dump small loads of material at convenience centers. Now, let me make something clear because of what I misheard. This is not about free dumping. If you have pounds in 18 your car and you go to one of these 19 centers, they charge you $100. The 20 minimum tub is for a ton. So you know, $30, something that's meant -- we're not talking about free. Free does not work anyway okay. All free does is move it from one place to another and bring you stuff you've never seen before. But this is about providing such opportunity so that people can bring their waste there and (inaudible) it there. And beyond that -- and I'll only say this and then Shari will put the onus on it, we don't have enough places to take stuff. Okay. We don't. This is something we can do. This is not a freebie. This is not something this can be taxed neutral. In fact, the Circular Philadelphia wrote a whole paper on this talking about the steps and how it could be tax neutral, but we need to do it. Now, it has been brought up and early on it was looked at by Carlton Williams and his crew. And I think it's going to take some time and effort to put it together. We don't know where it is, but that's a real powerful thing that we could do at least to get started. Beyond that I believe that we do need to make really clear we need to publicize these folks that are doing it because shaming really works. I mean, people will stop doing it and pay for it because they don't want to get acknowledged. So I've learned over the years working with the Law Department if you ask them if it can be done, they tell you all the reasons why it can't. If you say this is what I need, they figure out how to get it done. So I mean, we need to make sure that we ask the right question, how can we make this happen and not what's in the way because that's what the lawyers do. But I've been around long enough that I know that that works.
It's come now more than ever because we're investing so much money into cleaning, which everyone has actually seen in the city of Philadelphia is actually working. But now, it's like, oh, how many more times can we do that, right? And so, I think you're right. There is a thing with the Law Department that I've noticed since the time I've been on Council that they have this tendency to always give reasons of why they can't do something. And I think you're right about this in alternate sources.
An important thing that I've been bringing up over and over again that I've never heard but I'm going to try it again. Okay. The City of Philadelphia's last comprehensive solid waste plan that looked at how we collect trash and where we put it was done in 1949. At that point in time we were collecting it on horse wagons and the biggest part of trash was the ash that we were picking up in 1949. When I was hired in 1985, part of it was to redo a comprehensive plan literally neighborhood-by-neighborhood to look at the best way, the most efficient way to collect. The only difference between trash collection now in 1949 is locomotion. We put an engine in instead of a horse wagon. Do you know why there are two workers and one driver on every one? It's because you can't drive the horse cart and pick up the trash at the same time. That is not a joke. That is the history of how we've come to this particular trash collection system. Let me be clear: We have one of the most hardest working group of people in the city who work for the Streets Department. They do 3000 miles of streets every week. That is a miracle. 3000 miles of streets every week they pick up. If you lined up the trucks of trash bumper-to-bumper of how much trash is collected in a year, it would go to Atlantic City six times and halfway back. That's a lot of trash. That's a lot of hard work. I don't want anybody to think that I am talking about anything that's wrong with people working hard. But we don't have a system of management and waste collection that is modern, that uses the best techniques, and we are spending a fortune and getting very little. And you want to do the math. Figure out how much it cost per worker to pick it up and that's when you're going to get an accurate number. Compare that to other cities. You're going to find out how much we are paying and not getting the service.
And that's the part I'm saying, like there could be a way that we spend less on the sanitation cleanup, we could possibly -- I'm sure some of the workers would love not doing so much heavy-lifting cleanup if we can help them in that way. And some of that money that we spend on all the cleanup stuff could go back into their pockets so they can just -- as workers and for their families. But the last thing I was just going to say and I just want to tell you, this has been very insightful this whole day. We've gotten a lot of ideas. And hopefully, we can really implement them this time around so we're not looking like the 19th and 20th century.
We need the comprehensive plan that we look at how we deal with trash in the city. Other cities do it once every four or five years. We haven't done it since 1949. Okay. One more time.
I'm sorry for your frustrations with that and I get it, but I've actually dealt with this one before so I wish you would give me a little time. I got the person's address now and I'm going to have my people start working on it. I found, because I've dealt with this with somebody else, and I'm still dealing with it, we had it, I had them come in, they cited them, they cleaned the whole thing up. Three weeks later he filled the front yard and backyard all back up. He's a hoarder --
I wish you would just give me a little bit of time. My office is 408 right down the hall. I have the picture of the lot. Please stop there and give your contact information to the person at the --
-- 408, yeah, right after you're done, right here. As a matter of fact, I'm going to give you my card and then you won't even have to do that. You can just call in.
I'll still stop there because this is so critically important.
Give me a couple of weeks to get this done because we have to do it legally (inaudible) --
Thank you graciously. This is well worth it because I'm about to go crazy.
Yeah, and I get it. But same thing with the person I'm trying to help. And that's in Port Richmond, the neighborhood is beautiful just like Parkside, and then you got this one guy in the middle of the block that's got a pile up to his windows.
Oh, his windows is just bulging. But the roof I'm really, really, really concerned about now.
Yes. Please just drop your contact information so we can stay in touch and I'm on it.
Thank you both for your testimony here today. (Applause.)
Mr. Pullin, would you please call the names for the next panel.
The next witnesses to testify are Shari Hersh of Trash Academy, Shannon Reiter of Keep Pennsylvania Beautiful. We have Lois Williams and Towanda Tynes of Trash Academy, David Evans and Leonard Rhett of Block by Block. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Good afternoon, Ms. Hersh. Please okay state your name for the record and begin with your testimony.
Please state your name for the record and begin with your testimony.
Yeah. My name is Shari Hersh. And first, I'm going to read Shannon Reiter's testimony. I am going to skip a bunch of it since it's on the record in consideration of how late it is. Thank you to Councilman Anthony Phillips for inviting me to present this testimony today and the subcommittee for Streets and Service for convening this critical issue -- on this critical issue of illegal dumping. My apologies for not being able to attend this hearing in person. My name is Shannon Reiter, Executive Director of Keep Pennsylvania Beautiful. I have been with this organization for nearly 20 years. And in that time, I learned valuable lessons about litter and illegal dumping. One of them is that if we want to address illegal dumping, we need to change our systems. Systems change takes time. It is incremental at best and it is hard. I was asked to speak about our work as it relates to illegal dumping, provide both context based on our research and insights on how we believe we can collectively tackle these issues. Before I begin sharing what we have learned through our research, there are two things I want to stress and ask you to consider at this hearing. First, it is critical to understand that illegal dumping is a behavior and behaviors can be changed. Social science has taught us that there are four primary mechanisms to drive that change, including written expectations; rewards and penalties; education; and Infrastructure. Cleanups are not a recognized mechanism for change. However, this leads me to my second point: While cleaning up illegal dumps does not stop illegal dumping, cleaning up illegal dumps does not stop illegal dumping, it is a necessary component of any larger strategy. With that said, I would like to provide an overview of our research and what we have learned. About 10 years ago, Keep Pennsylvania Beautiful released Illegal Dumping in Pennsylvania, a Decade of Discovery, recommended policies and regulatory changes to prevent illegal dumping in Pennsylvania. This report was a culmination of over a decade of studying and mapping illegal dumpsites in every municipality across the Commonwealth, a public opinion survey and an illegal dump cleanup cost analysis. In summary, Keep Pennsylvania Beautiful documented over 6,000 illegal dumpsites. KPB also found that the average community cleanup cost was nearly $3,000. It cost 617 a ton to clean up an illegal dump site, nearly nine times the cost of proper disposal at a landfill. That was in 2014. We can only assume those costs have risen. The purpose of the study was to document and understand the full extent of illegal dumping, beginning with information gathered by KPB and supplemented by other sources, including surveys, cleanups, stakeholder focus groups and a public opinion poll. Based on the conclusions of the analysis, the report provides recommended programs and policies that could help prevent illegal dumping. The research confirmed illegal dumping is not an isolated problem. Dumpsites are found in cities, along rural roads and back alleys and over hillsides. There are certain commonalities in the materials left at dumpsites and in the conditions and circumstances that facilitate the behavior. With that in mind, we categorize dumpsites into the four following categories: Inactive legacy dumpsites, which in Philly are active legacy dumpsites; active commercial waste dumping; active dumping of household waste and theft of service. The report outlines different approaches to address the four types of illegal dumping. It is important to understand that the motivator for active commercial dumping is different than those dumping household waste. We learned that there are root causes for illegal dumping that can be summarized as lack of awareness, ability to pay and financial gain. Although illegal dumping is a crime, it is often committed by people who otherwise would not consider themselves criminals in nature.
Some people get mixed signals about the existence or remediation of dumpsites, believing them to be publicly-maintained disposal areas. A sense of entitlement exists for those who believe that the public has access and open use of every dumpster. There are instances where people simply do not have the resources to pay for proper waste management. Households living below the poverty line can be placed in situations in which they must make difficult choices between their families, immediate needs and obeying the law. The willingness to pay is very different than the ability to pay. A portion of illegal dumpers do so to avoid the cost of disposal for which they have already charged their customers. There are individuals and businesses that use illegal disposal to cut their operating cost and use it as a competitive edge against honest and responsible businesses. Their willingness to pay is what drives commercial dumping, including the large tire piles and mounds of construction and demolition waste that are all too familiar across Philadelphia. In addition, the research shows that illegal dumping occurs most frequently where the risk of detection and penalties is low, where there is a lack of acceptable disposal or recycling outlets. Finally, the public has a poor understanding of what constitutes illegal dumping and even elected officials are often uncertain how they can ensure that cost-effective, universal access options are available. Law enforcement and judicial officials may not be aware of the full impact or the cost of the community. The research suggests possible solutions to aid in preventing dumping. And while not all would be applicable to Philadelphia, they could be worth considering. I encourage you to review the report for full analysis and findings. In 2019 in partnership with the Department of Environmental Protection and PennDOT, KPB released the Pennsylvania Litter Research study which found that Pennsylvania roadways have more than 500 million pieces of litter. Simultaneously KPB released the cost of litter and illegal dumping in Pennsylvania, a study of nine cities. The latter report is most relevant to today's discussion. The research expanded our efforts to quantify the challenges associated with litter and illegal dumping and provided an indepth analysis of the costs incurred by individual municipalities when managing litter and illegal dumping at the municipal level. The study provided cost averages for the following: Litter prevention, illegal dump prevention, education outreach, litter abatement, illegal dump abatement and enforcement. Regardless of size and geography, each of the nine case-study cities spent significant sums annually to prevent and clean up litter and illegal dumping. No two cities were identical in their approaches, but one thing is evident when looking at these costs in aggregate. More resources have been allocated to the abatement of litter and illegal dumping than to measures that are categories as prevention, education and outreach or enforcement. As mentioned, these are recognized mechanisms to change behavior. Financial resource allocation for the nine cities was as follows: 80% of all analyzed costs were categorized as abatement, which is cleanup. Did you hear that, 80% of all analyzed costs were categorized as abatement, that's cleanup. 13% were infrastructure-based solutions. 6% represented enforcement programs. And just 1% represented education and outreach. Overall this means that these cities spend about four times as much to remove litter and dump material from their communities as they do to prevent it from being generated in the first place. In the long run, the only way to reduce this cost burden overall will be to invest more in preventive measures. Because without them, the cost of abatement will only continue to rise.
I encourage stakeholders to review this report and know that there are case studies for each city that highlight their specific findings but also the different ways they are tackling these issues. Philadelphia did participate in this study and those findings will be shared by a following presenter. In conclusion, as Philadelphia continues to develop their strategy to address illegal dumping I encourage stakeholders to consider each of the four mechanisms for change: While necessary, cleanups alone will not change behavior. A successful strategy will also address laws, enforcement, infrastructure and education. Mine is a lot shorter.
Oh, so that wasn't yours. That was still -- okay. Thank you. Please proceed. So if you don't mind, if you can summarize. We do have the testimony written as well. We have everyone's written testimony as well that will be included for the record.
You have it all, yeah. So I'm actually going to only talk about prevention and small haulers. So I'm going to talk about the scale of the problem and one of our proposed solutions to commercial dumping on the streets and vacant lots of Philly. So we embrace the Clean and Green initiative. But with over 40,000 vacant lots and nearly 3000 miles of streets in Philadelphia, cleaning alone is neither viable nor cost-effective in ending dumping. So I'm going to read to you the four drivers of illegal dumping and all of them are relevant for small haulers: Illegal dumping occurs most frequently in areas where the risk of detection and penalties are low. Economic conditions and business opportunities lure individuals to dump illegally, a lack of acceptable disposal or recycling outlets which tempts people to dump illegally and active illegal dumpsites attract others to dump illegally. So they have all four things are present in small haulers. It is -- small haulers are part of the ecosystem of waste management. When you have a kitchen remodel or small repair, what do you do with the discarded materials? It's against the rules to put those materials in our trash. So where are those materials going? Guess what's in the black bags that you see in our vacant lots and alleys? It's primarily C&D waste. It's actually primarily sheetrock broken up from small jobs. We are calling for the sanitation convenience centers to accept the load of small haulers for a small fee implemented through the eCLIPSE system to better legally manage these materials. S. It's 17%. C&D waste is one of the leading materials in dumpsites. To better understand what drives C&D waste through our participatory research practice, we conducted a deep dive into sheetrock. With 14 people in the room, from sanitation workers to block captains, closed loop material specialists and recycle experts, among others, we were shocked to find an enormous glaring hole in the system here in Philly. There is no real plan for small haulers to legally manage their loads. If the issue of small haulers is adequately addressed, we will see a major shift in illegal dumping in our neighborhoods. There are two problems. One is that small haulers have to pay the same minimum tipping fee as a large compactor, which is typically a ton or 2000 pounds. There is only one site in Philly, one in the whole city that will accept smaller loads for $90. But the minimum range is about $140 a load. To give you a sense of the size of a small vehicle load, when a tree came down in my yard and we cut it up and took it to the Fairmount Recycle Center, it filled my car, like you couldn't see out of the windows, and it weighed 80 pounds. So they're being charged for 2000 pounds whether or not they have a small pickup truck or whatever. The second issue is there are only four places in the entire city that accept the loads of small haulers. Currently, the city website lists locations for 4 C&D waste disposal, but only four 5 of those accept loads from small 6 haulers. Of those four, only two 7 have the correct phone number. 8 Really? 9 Last, I want to point 10 out that when we cleaned up dumped 11 material from vacant lots and 12 streets, when we, all of us, the 13 city of Philly, it ultimately ends up in Chester to be incinerated or it is dumped in the Tullytown landfill. If we expand the use of convenience centers, waste can be sorted and diverted into reuse, lessening our impact on the environment and our good friends in Chester. We must solve this issue. Where and when there's a lack of acceptable disposal or recycling outlets, dumping will continue to occur. And to repeat the research about prevention, in the long run the only way to reduce this cost burden of dumping overall will be to invest more in preventive measures, because without them the cost of cleaning will only continue to rise.
At the scale of our dear city, neither cleaning nor enforcement will be effective enough without addressing this critical issue of small loads of C&D waste most often in the hands of small haulers.
Thank you so much for your testimony. Please state your name for the record and begin with your testimony.
As a quick request, can you please if possible summarize your comments.
Yes. So we do have -- if you submit a written testimony, we do have your written testimony that will be made a part of the record. It is a part of the record. We have been reviewing the written testimony while we were up here and prior to the hearing as well. So if you can summarize, that would be helpful.
Mine is short and sweet. Well, not so sweet. My name is Lois Williams. Good morning -- well, good evening everyone. First, I want to thank Councilman Phillips for getting us here today. And I am a Co-director of Trash Academy and also a member of HACE NAS. That's the Neighborhood Advisory Subcommittee, and I'm in Councilwoman Quetcy Lozada's District. I'm in 19140, Fairhill. I'm here to talk about legacy dumpsites. I want to direct your attention to the post on display, a legacy dumpsite weeks after the sitewide cleanup. And you just saw the pictures. This is right after the dumpsite cleanup. There are two sites one block from me. One is at 4th and Westmoreland right next to a day care center and an elementary school. The other is on Ontario between Orkney and Lawrence Street. I live on Lawrence Street. These sites have been dumped and cleaned for the 10 years that I've been living on Lawrence Street. My son is disabled. This is the part that really pisses me off. My son is disabled and he uses a powered wheelchair. He would like to be able to just go right around the corner to the store on his own, but he can't because that's where that dumpsite is. He would have to get out in the street just to get around that to go to the store. And I mean, would you want your child to have to do that? Okay. We have been cleaning these sites for many years and we are tired of it. People in Chestnut Hill don't have to go through this. What we need to see is prevention, enforcement and exposure of these people that keep dumping on our sites. I mean, shame them, you know what I'm saying. I really believe that that will help. With this we can stop dumping. I commend the Mayor for her Clean and Green program, but cleaning is not enough. We need to judge progress not by how many blocks were clean, but how long they stay clean. Me and all the people you see here would greatly appreciate the right kind of help, which is cleaning, prevention and enforcement. We would like this to be solved by 2028. And if we work together, we can get this done. I believe that. I also want to say one more thing. I am getting ready to buy a new sofa. I have no idea what to do with the old one. From what I understand, if you call for a bulk pickup, it's like a month backlog. So what am I supposed to do with the old sofa? And I'm supposed to be getting one within the next couple of weeks. I'm done. (Applause.)
My people being members of Philadelphia City Council and my fellow city residents. I am Teea Tynes, proud resident of zip code 19133 and that's the Fairhill section of North Philadelphia. I'm a member HACE Neighborhood Advisory Subcommittee and Die Dumping Die and Co-director of Trash Academy, a grassroots organization that addresses litter and dumping on a systems level. Mayor Parker's introduction of PhillyStat360 is supposed to, as stated on the website, empower City departments to set ambitious goals, enhance performance and boost community satisfaction. That is very much appreciated. We hope that it will offer much-needed transparency and accurate metrics. Out of the five indicators that this tool is tracking, we're here to address the cleaner indicator as it pertains to illegal dumping. I've noted since first reviewing the PhillyStat360 site in January that the cleanup time has gone from to days with a 7 target time of five days. This 8 would indicate system limitations. 9 It suggests the need for a direct 10 link between 311 calls and cleanup 11 data. 12 Here are some steps we 13 can take to set realistic and 14 achievable goals for cleaning up 15 illegal dumpsites in Philadelphia: 16 One, improved transparency and data collection on the 311 system to ensure the PhillyStat360 metrics are clearly connected to 311 call data so we can understand how effectively the City is responding to reported dumpsites. Two, foster collaboration with relevant city offices to get detailed information on the 311 system and illegal dumping metrics to understand the full context behind the numbers being reported, including the number of sites, average cleanup times and tonnage collected. Three, advocate for the City to set initial cleanup goals that are based on their current capacity, starting at a realistic level like the 16-day average we're seeing now. Then work to gradually improve that over time. Four, push for the City to measure and report on not just cleanup times but also the total number of sites addressed and the volume of waste removed. This will give a more complete picture of progress against illegal dumping. Five, engage community members to consistently report dumpsites through 311 so the City has accurate data on the full scope of the problem. This will help inform realistic goal-setting. I have some other key additional metrics and targets that should be included on the PhillyStat360 dashboard so that it can be better addressed -- excuse me, to better address systemic issues like illegal dumping. But that's a part of, you know, you have a copy of that already so I'll leave that. So initially we want cleaning and waste removal to increase. Then we want these things to decrease because they will be unnecessary. Think of this as a sign on the job that tells you the accident-free number of days in the workplace. Holistically, this can be done by way of abatement, which is cleaning up, education and outreach, prevention and enforcement. Others have and will talk about those things this afternoon. It is folly to think that cleaning alone can cure the city of this ill. It is a mere bandage on something that should be regarded as a rapidly metastasizing cancer. Also, bandages are quite costly. $48 million a year. Cure or darn near a cure is more costly upfront, but in the long run can give the patient a better quality of life, life-saving and pocket saving. Just think of what the funds spent on bandages can be used for other than bandages. A cleaner city and a reallocation of funds would be a grand outcome. So I'd like to thank you for your time and attention. Make it a great day and best in health. (Applause.)
Thank you so much for your testimony, Ms. Tynes. Mr. Evans, please state your name for the record and begin your testimony.
All right. Hello, everyone. David Evans. I'm here because I love Philly. I want to share about our next steps. I live down North in the zip code 19121. I am co-founder of the nonprofit Block by Block Philly, where our mission is to make Philly the cleanest city in America. We began this nonprofit five years ago to support neighbors who want to clean their blocks. We provide tools, sponsor refreshments and music. We make a party out of the cleaning experience. However, we need more efforts in preventing dumping. Block by block Philly was invited to join forces with this dynamic group three years ago because of an anti-dumping rant on Instagram. And here I am most interested in putting Block by Block Philly out of business. I'm here to share about one site that continuously gets dumped on as -- sorry. I am here to share about sites that continuously get dumped on. We've coined them legacy dumpsites. The one legacy dumpsite I'm going to share with you is behind an elementary school at 25th and Diamond called William Dick. The last time this site was dumped on they left construction material. The upsetting part is that there's a convenience center, a free dumpsite, a block and a half away from the school. The ironic part is that this same convenience center does not allow anyone in Philly to dispose of construction materials. Tell me about our next step. Our current step to get this legacy dumpsite cleaned is call 311, call CLIP, call the Sanitation Department or call our District City Councilmember. Either way it cost monies to pick up. So let's work smarter. Let's cut out the middleman, invest in our next step. Our next step is to open at least one of the six convenience centers to construction materials. Allow small haulers to pay a nominal fee and deliver construction materials properly instead of legacy dumping behind our train tracks, our elementary schools and our lots. I believe that we can make today better than yesterday by turning Philly into a culture of clean. It starts right here, right now, in this room, with this community. I believe that we can end dumping by 2028. I believe in the best of us because I love us. Let's go Philly. (Applause.)
Thank you for your testimony. I do have a couple of questions just for anyone on this panel. If you can explain to us what research or what data exists that tells us that if we were to reduce fees, that the bad actors will utilize these centers?
It's not really reducing fees. The high fees are at the commercial facilities. It's 2000 pounds. We're saying accept their small loads and charge them for it but in a proportional way to make it affordable because we think it's the high bar and the lack of places that's contributing to so much vacant lot and park dumping.
Okay. So you believe that if we provide incentives that are proportional, a price that's proportional, then some of the bad actors will stop being bad actors and will pay to dump their waste at some of these sites?
Yes. And it's part of a bigger strategy. You know, it has to be multi- pronged. But, yeah.
Thank you. Any questions from members of the Committee for the panel? Chair recognizes Councilmember Harrity.
I agree that there needs to be another avenue. Like you said, if they're charging $100 a ton, it's 2000 pounds. You're not -- you know, you got a couch and something like that, if they charge the minimum like a quarter of a ton, so it'd be like 20, bucks. People 5 I agree would pay the 20, 25 bucks 6 rather than dump on the street. 7 But if you got to pay 100 bucks 8 rather than 25 bucks in our 9 neighborhoods that becomes 10 something different. 11 And I agree. I mean, I 12 see it all the time. A lot of the 13 dumping that's going on in my 14 neighborhood is actually from the 15 neighbors, you know what I'm 16 saying. So I get it, I get it and 17 we get that. I just don't know 18 how. I'd have to get with some of 19 my smarter colleagues that are 20 lawyers to figure out how we get 21 the private companies to lower 22 their rates. I know some of them 23 do a half a ton, but still that's 24 $50, $60, you know.
And Burns opened his site to small haulers on Saturdays and they were overwhelmed.
Which actually goes to your point which is if there was a place for them to take it, would they use it. That's the whole thing. That's this kind of hole in our system right now. And since so much of the illegal dumping is C&D waste, it's because of that hole. It has to be addressed.
Yeah. So I still don't really know what to do with my old sofa. Nobody can tell me what to do with the sofa because I can't put it out with my trash and I can't hold in my house? So what am I supposed to --
Yeah, we could -- or you can even call your City Council Office to help them arrange the bulk pickup from the City. But if you put it out, most likely they're going to -- we can work with them to take it.
I can tell you the trash guys in my neighborhood they throw them right in there.
Because it's a pain anyway. And they figure they're going to send them back later to get it when I complain I guess, so they take it. I've seen them throw them things right in the truck in my neighborhood.
Yeah, yeah. Because they'll try to get away with it, but I believe they're supposed to take couches.
Mattresses they don't have to take because of the bed bug thing. They have to be wrapped a certain way. But couches, I believe they just throw them in the back of the --
I mean, they break up fairly easy. Once they start that crushing thing, that thing chomps into little pieces in no time.
Councilmember Phillips, do you have anything else to include with that?
Thank you. Any other questions for this panel? (No response.)
Seeing none, thank you so much for your testimony. (Applause.)
Can we get Leonard Rhett and then the final witnesses to testify are Justin DiBerardinis, Jazmin Ricks and Philip Gritzmacher. (Witnesses approached Witness table.)
Thank you. Please state your name for the record and begin with your testimony.
-- members of this Committee, Councilman Anthony Phillips. I have one thing that I want to do here. My name is Leonard Rhett. I live in the 19120 section of Philadelphia which is Olney. I'm a Block Captain. I've been so for the last nine years. I'm also a committee member and I enjoy being a part of Trash Academy and Clean Philly Now. I'm going to hold up something because I want to get your reaction to it and it's not going to make any sense. Tell me what you think when you see this. What do you think when you see this? (Applause.)
Take that sentiment, multiply it by 100,000 and that's how frustrated we are with illegal dumping in the city. We fight for this. I'm also a block captain so I don't have a problem working with the Parker Administration. I don't have to work for her or anybody else because I live here. My son is 14 years old. He has never played outside on our block because of the dumping that goes on. And at this particular point the time for talk is over. We can have meeting after meeting. We can have community meeting after community meeting. We can have hearing after hearing. I'm pretty sure all of our Councilmembers are aware of what's going on with illegal dumping in the city. I'm pretty sure of that. But all we are doing is talking. We've been talking for a long time. We need to see actions. We need to see it in motion. I'm a block captain. There are times when these committees have been set up or crews that set up to come out to clean up the blocks, it would be nice if we as block captains can be notified when they're coming so we can work with you to make that effort easier. We don't get that notification. When we find out anything, they're coming down the street. My block has been on a ban, a 10-year ban to keep it being closed off for block cleanups. And I'm trying to get Captain Burks at the 35th to explain why it happened and how we can get it done to remove, because many of you know it and you've been here a while, block parties are as essential to the city of Philadelphia as the cheesesteak and the Philadelphia Eagles and all of y'all know that. All of you know that. But to tell us that we can't do it for 10 years is a travesty in itself. That's how a lot of our connection with our neighbors is done through block parties. They come out, you meet them, you conversate with them, you share different things with them. I haven't been able to do that the entire time I've been a block captain over there. It is the 200 and 300 block of East Albanus. It is a different block because it has no break in it.
The 200 block of East Albanus, I'm very familiar with that block --
No, it's in the 9th District. I have friends and family around there.
It's actually the 8th District. Cindy Bass is my Councilperson. And I can honestly say that since she's taken over this District, I have developed a relationship with her that I'm positive that we are going to get things done. But at the end of it, all I'm asking for is we eliminate all the conversations and actually start working towards it. That's all I want. That's all my neighbors want. We had just -- there's a lot that's directly across from my house that had two cars sitting on it for over a year. That's me, the ugly guy in the picture. But it took so long, a number of 311 calls, a number of calls to different departments. I even had Crystal Jacobs come out once. So it's not a question of not knowing. We just want to see action. That's all we want. That's all I want. I have no problem with working with anybody in this city if we can work towards something where we can get this cleaned up. Sustained effective enforcement, sustained effective prevention, sustained preventive education, all of these things can be done because there are enough people here to get it done. In all honesty, I don't think we need to go outside the city to get it. Everything that we need to fix this problem is in the house. It is here already. And instead of spending money to have outside people come in, use the resources we have in this city. They are there. That's all I'm asking for. I want to work with anybody who wants to work with me because I live here, I love it here and I want to lead this city better than I found it. (Applause.)
Thank you so much for your testimony. Please proceed with your testimony. State your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.
Certainly. My name is Philip Gritzmacher and I reside in the Lawncrest section of the city. I'm Secretary of the Lawncrest Community Association and I'm here to discuss an issue of concern to our community. Actually Councilman Phillips in his early remarks talked a fair amount about this. The 5600 block of Newtown Avenue is a one-way street running northbound from Adams Avenue to Godfrey Avenue in our community. It is a poorly-lit and isolated street which has attracted a serious amount of short-dumping for many years. Community member Dallas Green has taken the lead in organizing regular cleanups and in prevailing upon the City to clean up the street on a regular basis. Multiple cameras have been installed but have not proven to be effective in reducing the short-dumping problem. The problems with short-dumping are serious enough to have led some members of the community to entertain the possibility of closing the street entirely. We feel this is an extreme solution and we would like to suggest an alternative path. We would like to suggest that Newtown Avenue be made into an entrance to the Tacony Park. This would enable members of the Lawncrest community to access the park, which is currently inaccessible to our community. m. m. Currently, the road has no sidewalk so in addition to the installation of gates, a sheltered sidewalk would need to be installed. We have discussed this with the TTF Watershed Partnership and they have pledged their cooperation with this plan. The Community Association discussed this plan at a recent meeting, and the consensus was that this plan would work to eliminate most of the short-dumping which occurs at night and will enhance the quality of life in our community by providing access to our world-level quality park system of the city of Philadelphia for the residents of our community. Thank you for your time and consideration. ) MR. DiBERARDINIS: Thank you, Committee. My name is Justin DiBerardinis. I'm the Executive Director of the TTF Watershed Partnership. This has been a long afternoon, but I actually have found it to be a joyful afternoon to be here with so many frontline trash warriors here in the city of Philadelphia. This hearing committee was filled with the people who are fighting day-to-day. And I actually find this to be an exciting moment to be someone who's fighting trash right now in Philadelphia because, one, we got an Administration that is taking this seriously and putting their name on we're going to be a clean and green city. At the same time, we got the William Penn Foundation systemically investing in the grassroots of keeping our neighborhoods clean. So many of the groups here today are receiving funding for the first time to take this on from the grassroots level. And I think it's at the grassroots level where we will win. So the funding is there. It's coming from the top from the Administration. It's coming from Council, but it's coming from the streets. And this is the moment where we're going to get Philadelphia clean. I want to talk about what we're going to do with the funding we're receiving from that to address some of the things we've talked about today. One, that pile of tires we see there, that is just across from Snake Road just so everyone knows what we're looking at on Snake Road up in the Lawncrest section of Philadelphia. That's not a historic image. That's on the ground today. That's 4000 tires. We're going to get those tires on April 5th. This is now the center piece, as Director Carlton Williams said, of the City spring cleanup. We are coming out in force 200-people deep to get those tires out of our park and take this park back, but there's more that we're going to be doing. Yeah, I think we can clap for that and we're going to need a lot of hands to get to 200 so anyone who's free on April 5th we can use you up at Adams and Snake Road because we're going to come for that and we're going to come for that together. ) MR.
DiBERARDINIS: But more importantly, we have funds as TTF to put night vision cellular trail cameras through this park. We are going to catch some of these guys this year. We're going to catch some of these folks in the act. And what I don't want to hear is that we can't prosecute people who we see their license plate and their car full of tires in the park overnight. That doesn't make any sense to me. Because I'm going to tell you this, the people of the city are fed up right now. And if we were to take that evidence and put it out in front of a jury of Philadelphians, I think they're going to do the right thing. I think that person is going to have to explain who had his truck that night, was his truck stolen? Who else in his family has his keys to the truck? I think we're talking about doing some basic police investigation. Because I'll say this, I know there's a lot of crime in this city. And that may not be a crime against a person, but that is a crime against the people and we should treat it like a crime against the people. And the other thing that we've got booked for those dollars we've got in, and I think it speaks to what I heard from Councilman Harrity today, we got money for billboards. Because when we catch these guys, those trucks are going up on billboards in the neighborhood. But I got to tell you, Councilmembers, please if we have the videos and the footage of these people with trucks full of tires in the park, we need to prosecute. We need to put them in front of a jury. And that's the thing that is just not happening. Because I'm going to tell you this, if that happened in New York, if that happened in Chicago, if that happened in Boston, someone would have some fear of God in them that they'd be going to jail to do that. They do not have that fear of God in Philadelphia. ) MR. DiBERARDINIS: Yeah, I'll take that. Thank you, Kathy. You can clap for that. If we put a couple of these guys on trial, I think we're going to send shock waves through the illegal dumping community in this city. But we're going to need to work together to do that. So the grassroots, we're on the front line. We're going to do it. We're going to need some help on the back end, but this is how we're going to turn it around. So that's all I got to say on that. Thank you everyone for staying for this hearing today. I think we did a great job. Thank you, Councilmembers, for being here with us. )
Thank you so much for your testimony, Mr. DiBerardinis. Are there any questions of these witnesses? (No response.)
I just want to briefly say, Phil and the whole Lawncrest Association, they've been amazing for many years with illegal dumping and cleanups. And I just love Justin's energy. He's really been great. He's just come into our neighborhood about a year ago and we had a lot of fresh ideas and vision. So we're excited about this. And to be honest with you, I just echo what Leonard said. There has been progress for residents who are listening with illegal dumping since this Administration has started because the Mayor as well as Carlton Williams, they're doing a lot of cleaning now that is way better. Their cleaning is way better than what the previous administration did. We all know that. Now, it's like all right, cool, we got that down, but now we got to get the other one down which is the prevention. And I think that's why I want to say, Leonard, we are making progress, but now we got to get on this prevention side better. So I think we're excited about it. So thank you so much. This has been a good hearing. I've got a lot from this. Thank you. We're going to do some work. (Applause.)
Thank you gentlemen for your testimony. Is there anyone else in the chambers wishing to make a comment on this matter? Did you speak already, sir?
Get on the mic please. (Witness approached Witness table.)
Dallas Herbert. I just want to say I think it's very important for the enforcement. I think we need transparency. I think when you catch these people dumping, the neighborhood needs to know who, when and where. That's all I want to say. You know me, I've been doing five years cleaning up and I've never received a word that said, well, we cleaned up or we're coming to clean up or we have cleaned up. I only know it when I go through there. I think you should -- the leader of that neighborhood should find out who, when and where once you catch somebody doing this.
Thank you so much. And with that, we heard a lot of testimony today from members of the public, folks, advocates, those in this industry and also the City. And I do think that there are some common themes that everyone can agree upon is that we need sustained enforcement and education measures. And I do think that as we look into this next budget cycle, those are some things that City Council will be looking at on how to get toward those goals of enforcement and education. So thank you so much for everyone's attendance today. And with that, this concludes the business before the Committee on Streets and Services today. Thank you very much for your attendance and your patience today for this long hearing. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. (Committee on Streets and Services concluded at 5:38 p.m.) C E R T I F I C A T I O N I, hereby certify that the proceedings and evidence noted are contained fully and accurately in the stenographic notes taken by me in the foregoing matter, and that this is a correct transcript of the same. __________________________________ TANEHA CARROLL