To Whom My Crap Concerns,I am a Queens local that has just had enough with the garbage situation. I've been complaining about it for way too long and I have finally decided to do something about it.
I recently created a twitter account (@CleanupQ) to tweet photos of the ridiculous amounts of trash in the street to the mayor and sanitation department. Hopefully I will get a decent following, but I'm not stopping there. I am reaching out to local photographers and queens based artists to document the filth in their neighborhoods. I'm going to ask that the document for a year and then hold an art gallery opening in Queens.
After reading your last blog post about people putting household trash in our small public bins, I knew I had to contact you about this project. I have to be honest, this is my fire time taking something like this on and any advice you could send my way would be greatly appreciated!
Sick of the trash covering my beautiful home!
Best,
Ashley Ann Pagano
13 comments:
Forget it Ashley, the new mayor has a different agenda, filth, crime, and jobs
aren't it. He will be fighting for equality, gender rights,sexual orientation rights, and all the real important things
Good for you, we need more people involved to be pro-active. You need any help contact me.
What is it people with the mayor and city departments?
All politics is local - go after your councilman and community board.
You always give them a pass and that is why we have the d*kheads that we have - the old ladies see them smiling next to a (immigrant, child, old lady, clueless prole) and actually believe they do work - when in reality its only an empty media event to fill the head of ... the little old lady.
THAT goes a long way to explain the past election.
I hope she beaks he site down by council districts, then we can bait them against each other and egg them on to compete with each other on actually getting work done.
Nice Job Ashley. It's a matter of exposing the issues that will create change.
Don't listen to these naysayers Ashley, keep doing what you are doing.
As far as the commment "What is it people with the mayor and city departments? All politics is local - go after your councilman and community board."
Many of us have and still go after those folks, but many of us have bad council members and community boards so we have to take it to another level.
Keep doing what you are doing Ashley, way too many people who comment here are so negative and do nothings, they are just as much the problem as the elected officials.
Think outside the box!
Hey Joe
If you councilman and your community board ignores you the mayor and the city bureaucracy will?
Can you give examples of how this has worked in the past?
I think the point is to gnaw at the cult of personality carefully cultivated in the local papers and at the local civics that lap up the attention when they get noticed by one of our local power brokers.
Trust me, if you councilman doesn't care the mayor doesn't give two shits either.
I agree, in local politics we are the serfs and our councilman is the landlord.
The unspoken rule is, short of bringing the mongols in to pillage, your councilman can pretty much do what he wants with and to you.
Moscow doesn't care for anything but tribute and as long as he sends it they look the other way.
With the change in who resides in Queens, there's been a change in where garbage goes: as soon as it can go on the street, it does. Even if this means hourly trips to the corner with a plastic bag to drop at an overflowing litter basket joining hundreds of others.
With people coming from parts of the world where everyone was indifferent to garbage everywhere, one might have hoped that they could assimilate to Queens 1970 (or you pick the year) - keep garbage out of site until pickup day - and leave street litter baskets for for street litter.
But assimilation actually worked the other way - Queens residents who lived here 30 or 40 years ago - they are also now putting out garbage at any time and putting household garbage next to street litter baskets - in imitation of new arrivals from Mexico City, Islamabad, Guangdong.
Without a change in the behavior of the residents in Queens, it will be impossible to fix the garbage problem.
Thank you. You guys are fabulous. either we wipe out the slum or the slum wipes us out. (Jacob Riis)
Keep up the good work!!
Ashley, you are doing a great thing. It's true that letters to local politicians and the Mayor will be ineffectual, but first do them anyway. Attend local community board meetings and raise awareness. Then, shift your focus to getting media and social network attention. Send constant updates with photos going on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. Keep the local blogging community updated about your blog. Reach out to borough reporters at NY1, CBS, etc showing your efforts and unanswered letters to pols. There is no faster way to get things done than by publicly embarrassing our local pols!
Keep it up! I really do believe you can make a difference, we all can. Even if its a small win at first it is a step in the right direction. It is a step in showing these politicians and people in power that we have a voice and are not afraid to speak.
Nothing is ever going to be perfect but there are basic needs for a community to function properly and the need for upkeep. These people in power are simply not the ones who live day in and day out in our communities, they don't know our neighbors, they don't feel the same love we have for our communities as much as we do. They really should be listening to us but they don't. So we take our time and effort to start a movement of change. Change for the better and movement of the people.
I too have fought the city for 10 long years about the filth and trash under the LIE on Queens Blvd. Between the Rego Center II mall and Queens Center Mall. Even local businesses and bakeries were dumping left over food daily in the area.
Finally after much letter writing NY1 covered my story and finally put 3 small trash baskets out in this very congested area. Clean up is slow but it has improved over the last few months a bit. I have tons of saved photos of the area with piles and piles of trash and then after shot of cleans streets and sidewalks.
DH (Rego Park)
After 10 long years of letter writing phoning sanitation commissioners and having local businesses help I finally had NY1 cover the story. Within 1 day we received 3 trash baskets for the area under the LIE on Queens Blvd. between Rego Center II and the Queens Center Mall. I have tons of pics from before and after over the last 6 years or so. It is not perfect but it has improved over the last several months. Local business that previously dumped doughnuts, muffins, and bagels has ceased doing this and the trash baskets are emptied every other day. It took a lot of energy and complaining but don't give up! Things can change!
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