Not much you can do about garbage woes
Jul 31, 2012, 10:55 AM | Updated: 12:53 pm
 In this photo taken Sunday July 29, 2012, Jose Diaz, who works at The Rusty Pelican restaurant in Seattle’s Wallingford neighborhood, loads cardboard into a recycling bin. (AP Photo/The Seattle Times, Bettina Hansen) |
>>>Waste Management strike
spreads
north
The trash is piling up, the raccoons are running amok, and
Luke wants to know what he can do as the Waste Management
strike goes on.
Not much, according to intrepid trash hound and reporter
Chris Sullivan.
Sullivan reports Waste Management continues to promise it
will eventually get all your trash, recycling and yard
waste. That means there will be no refunds on your bill.
You can forget having Waste Management pick up the tab for
a dump run.
“The woman from Waste management laughed ‘you can send the
bill to us, but it doesn’t work that way,'” Sullivan tells
Ross and Burbank.
Luke just wants someone to get rid of his refuse.
“I can’t just leave a garbage out next to my garbage can
because it will be torn open and spread all over the
alley,” Luke complains.
“It’s going to get worse before it gets better,” predicts
co-host Dave Ross. Waste Management has brought in
temporary drivers and the company is focusing on
commercial customers like restaurants. Even though the
company could start facing fines beginning Wednesday,
Sullivan reports Waste Management seems more than willing
to wait out the stalemate and rely on replacements
instead.
With garbage haulers refusing to cross the pickets by the
recycle and trash drivers, many customers are getting
angry with all the drivers involved. Luke is one of them.
“You either do the job or quit the job because it
doesn’t pay enough. But to not want to do the job and then
stop someone else from doing the job that really
frustrates me, as a person who has a pile of garbage in
his backyard.”
Even when residential service returns, Luke won’t be
happy. Customers will still have to wait until their
subsequent regularly scheduled day, meaning it could be
another six days after a settlement before the trash man
cometh. “It’s inherently unfair,” Luke complains.
“You can’t play catchup,” Sullivan says.
“No, start picking up that Thursday trash from last week.
We’re the one’s in rough shape,” Luke replies.
