Trash For Thee, Not for Me: Mayor Parker’s District is Treated Great! How About You?

For the last few days, I’ve been going to Trash Drop-off Sites around Northwest Philadelphia and documenting what I’ve seen. After driving to multiple sites across multiple days, I want to present a few things I’ve found.

Most importantly, Parker’s 9th District is getting treated better than most of the city by a very wide margin.

With the sole exception of 11th and Wyoming, which incorporated two sites by the Logan Triangle, every Drop-off Site (Parker Pile) in the 9th District was staffed, well-maintained, and serviced. After speaking to people working at these locations, I learned a few things. First, these sites were a mess after the first day of the strike. Trash bags were everywhere, and in some cases, I saw this first hand. At 1400 E Tulpehocken Ave on the first day, trash bags were piled high along the fence for Martin Luther King, Jr. High School. The next day the bags were gone and replaced with a blue Tri-State Waste & Recycling, Inc. dumpster. 

In fact, every Parker Pile location in the 9th District had a Tri-State Waste dumpster, along with at least one person cleaning the location. The people working there are told to help people put trash in the dumpster, and in some cases, to clean up the areas as well. After speaking to one person, they told me they get $30 an hour for the work. After seeing them help someone, I also saw them get a nice cash tip on top of that. The job, it seems, comes with additional perks. Speaking to people working on the sites, they were brought in after the first day of the strike after doing the initial clean-up.

Over at 3rd and 65th Avenue, there are an astounding six dumpsters! Each one is well maintained. While there is a drop-off listed at around 2nd and Godfrey at the former Cardinal Dougherty High School, it seems it most likely was moved here. No location I visited had anything else like this.

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The 8th District, though, was a different story.

While one site I visited had someone working there, they were only assisting people, not cleaning up the site. With trash spilling off the street and into the main road, and only one dumpster to use, there was no way to clean and maintain the location at Germantown and Washington Lane. “My [partner] won’t even use the sites,” they said, “[they] don’t want to add to the problem!” They then mentioned that they were expected to work 12 hour shifts.

Over at Germantown Ave and Queens Lane, the corner lot is buried under mounds of trash. Sadly, this isn’t even the official drop-off site. That’s on Queens Lane, further down on a one-way street that you can’t turn onto from Germantown Ave. On my initial visit on Thursday, July 3rd, the two dumpsters were absolutely overflowing into the street, the sidewalks a mess, and the church and their cemetery right next door. 

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Chestnut Hill, though, was spared this nightmare. After the first two days of the strike, the location at 100 E Mermaid Lane was closed on Thursday. When I went there, a dump truck was sitting there to collect trash from anyone there. Located next to it was a sign directing people to dump their trash somewhere else. Where should the wealthiest people in Philadelphia go to dispose of their trash?

Why, to the middle-class and poor neighborhood at 6100 Ardleigh Street.

The Ardleigh Street Parker Pile was the absolute worst of everything I saw. Located on a long stretch of road, the two dumpsters sat between a few houses and Awbury Arboretum. One dumpster sat directly in front of the former Ada H. H. Lewis Middle School. After 2 days, the Parker Pile was longer than the building itself, the dumpster overflowing, and the smell of massive decay wafting in the breeze. The one across the street, located directly across the street from the spray fountain and playground at the rec center, was nearly as bad. As night fell on July 3rd, the power had gotten even worse.

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Today, on Friday, July 4th, the scene at the 8th District is vastly different. Crews are cleaning up the piles across the 8th District. While the Parker Piles are still there, and fairly bad, there is some remediation. It at least isn’t 2 days of trash.

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Why are we here?

As AFSCME D.C.33 (DC33) continues their strike after going onto the picket lines at 12:01 AM on Tuesday, July 1st, the city is dealing with the first sanitation strike in nearly 40 years. Philadelphia sanitation workers’ are the worst paid of any major city at about $18 per hour. Most places pay $25 an hour with Chicago paying nearly $40. The average yearly salary is $36,000 a year.

But DC33 isn’t just sanitation workers. It’s also 911 operators, life guards, librarians, water department workers, and medical examiners, just to name a few of the more than nearly 10,000 employees in this union. 

At the same time their contract expired, contracts for DC47 and the Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) did, too. Both unions are prohibited from striking, and neither union has held a strike authorization vote. Additionally, the Teacher’s Unions’ contract expires at the end of August.

Last year, DC33 was given a 5% raise. Yet in that same time, Mayor Parker took on Mayor Kenney’s ending salary, resulting in what amounts to a 9% raise approved by City Council. Along with that, she gets an annual Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) on top of that, which will likely translate to a 3% annual raise. She now makes a staggering $269,708 a year, more than even than the mayor of New York City. This, despite being the mayor of the poorest major city in America.

Meanwhile, sanitation workers in DC33 have been offered a 8% raise over 4 years, amounting to a 2% annual raise, far less than COLA.

Workers are asking for an annual 8% raise each year of their 4-year contract, which would bump up their salaries from $34,000 to $46,256. This, despite the average cost of living in Philadelphia being over $60,000 as of right now. 

Everyone working the sites all said that they believed the sanitation workers absolutely deserved more money and a fair contract. In fact, every resident I spoke to said the same thing: Pay the workers a fair wage, they’re not paid enough!

Closing Thoughts

So while reports are coming in from all around Philadelphia that trash is piling up everywhere, the stench is unbearable, and they want the workers to be treated well, Parker and her district are getting preferential treatment. Well-maintained dump sites, on-site help for anyone who comes by, and consistent crews coming up to clean their Parker Piles. 

Can you say the same about your neighborhood?