New York City’s yearslong effort to overhaul how trash is collected from businesses has hit another bump in the road.
A 2019 law requires the sanitation department to create 20 “commercial waste zones,” and assign as many as three private haulers as the only companies that can pick up garbage from businesses in each area. The new regime was meant to crack down on duplicative routes and safety issues around the current system.
The program’s rollout has already faced years of delays — and now an auditing error revealed on Tuesday has caused further problems, Sanitation Commissioner Jessica Tisch said during a City Council hearing.
The sanitation department’s system initially had errors in ranking applications from garage hauling companies that put in bids to win coveted private trash pickup rights in each zone, Tisch said.
She blamed the problem on Amsterdam-based consulting firm Arcadis. The sanitation department hired the company for $8 million to consult on commercial waste zones, city records show.
Representatives from Arcadis declined to comment on the company’s contract with the city.
Tisch said the error was identified “very early on in the negotiation process.” The application reviews with the private haulers were paused while the problem was resolved, and officials said the issue didn’t cost the department any additional money.
But the hiccup marks yet another snag in a fraught process to reign in one of the city’s most notorious industries.
Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso — who pushed through the 2019 law mandating commercial waste zones as a city councilmember — said he was frustrated by the program’s slow rollout.
“Implementation of Commercial Waste Zones [CWZ] is on track to be three years late – and New York City can’t afford to wait any longer,” Reynoso wrote in a statement. “Every day that CWZ implementation is delayed is another day New York City goes without essential reforms to the private sanitation industry,…
Read the full article here
Leave a Reply