Reports of rodent sightings fell by roughly 15% last month compared to May 2022, according to data from the city’s 311 complaint database analyzed by Gothamist.
Since the start of the pandemic in 2020, annual rodent sightings had been increasing in the five boroughs, prompting a series of citywide laws and initiatives targeting rats. In April, the city began requiring residential buildings to leave curbside garbage out later in the evenings instead of afternoons in an effort to cut down the hours trash spends on the streets in the hopes that ravenous rats will abate.
Mayor Eric Adams — known for his long-standing hatred of rats that began before he got to City Hall — also named a “rat czar” to reduce the city’s rat population.
The decline in complaints last month was driven by residents in Brooklyn, the Bronx and Manhattan, according to 311 data. Meanwhile, Queens and Staten Island residents had more rat reports in May compared to May 2022.
While the number of vermin complaints is down, it’s too soon to breathe a sigh of relief — rat complaints typically peak in the summer months, data shows.
Some neighborhoods faced increased rodent sightings between January and May 2023, compared to the same period last year. In Astoria, rat reports nearly doubled from 95 sightings to 181. But in areas like the Upper West Side and Central Harlem, with some of the highest numbers of rat sightings, reported complaints are down, according to the 311 data.
Last year’s record-high number of rat sighting complaints was driven by a series of factors, including a return to in-person work and higher temperatures, said Pedro Frisneda, deputy press secretary for the city’s health department.
“I think the question was not ‘why is 2023 lower’ but ‘why was 2022 higher,’” Frisneda said, noting that rat sighting complaints last month more closely resemble the figures from May 2021.
Frisneda pointed to a broad range of initiatives targeting rats including…
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