Trash Talk
Philadelphia is talking a lot of sense on its trash crisis. Is Mayor Kenney listening?
“[T]here’s a whole lotta shouting going on from our respective amen corners,” writes Larry Platt for The Philadelphia Citizen. That’s true nationwide, but it’s especially true in Philadelphia, which has the misfortune of being faced with both a “tsunami of crises” and a crisis of leadership. And it’s especially true in 2022, after nearly two years of living perpetually on-edge and perpetually online.
In such a hyper-charged atmosphere, productive discourse may seem like a pipedream. But it’s not: “amidst all the noise, it’s easy to forget that most voters are just trying to get by and still embrace practical solutions.” Platt’s advice to Mayor Kenney? Put the bigger, more complicated problems aside for now. Just “fill the damn potholes” and “declare war on litter.” Philadelphians are demoralized, divided, and dumbfounded at the City’s inability to provide even the most basic of municipal services. We may not be able to agree on much, but we perhaps we can all get behind making our streets a little less filthy.
If so, then Charles D. Ellison has some good news for us:
The solutions are there. Glitter App’s Morgan Berman argued during WURD’s 2020 ecoWURD summit at Bartram’s Garden that just $16 million from the city budget to employ several hundred Philadelphians-in-need at a $25/hour wage could activate that app to clean the city’s 10,000 most trash-hit blocks. If the city found the money to increase the Streets Department budget so dramatically during the pandemic, why can’t it find what amounts to 9.4 percent of that Department’s FY21 budget to end the trash crisis city-wide? Not only would you do that, but you could easily employ people in the communities most impacted by that trash.
Here we have a specific, targeted plan to clean the dirtiest parts of the city. And to create good paying jobs for the city’s poorest residents in the process. AND it’s not just an idea — a pilot version of Glitter already exists. All we need to do is funnel some money Berman’s way.
And on that note, time for a brief, open letter.
Dear Mayor Kenney:
Your constituents are prepared to accept that you are “not a visionary leader” and that “our biggest challenges—like gun violence—are beyond [your] power to solve.” We’re even prepared to accept that our smallest challenges are beyond your power to solve. We’re so desperate for something good to happen that all you need to do to make us happy is free up some funding for someone else to solve your problems for you.
Let Berman make you look good. We’ll all know that’s what’s happening. We’ll all know that she’s the reason our streets are clean. But we’ll humor you, and we’ll let you take credit for her success. When Filthadelphia finally becomes a misnomer, we’ll hoist you up on a chair — hell, a throne! — and we’ll parade you around the streets that you made sparkle.
Sincerely,
Voters who’d kiss the ground beneath your feet if only it wasn’t buried in garbage