The Mayor's War on Rats!

[bobobb.livejournal.com]

Apparently my house wasn't the only one to be hit by rats last year....and now the mayor has responded with a rather cool initiative.

http://www.boston.com/yourtown/news/somerville/2013/11/somerville_mayor_declares_war_on_rats.html

"The city is preparing a new program to offer free rodent control for homeowners and aims to launch a uniform residential trash barrel program to help keep rats from eating out of trash cans."

Also apparently looking into rat birth control...

Comments

[avjudge]

I think the 32-gallon limit is because they're handled manually, so the workers have to lift them. They've gotten new automatic trucks for the recycling, and I'd guess they'd have to do the same for the garbage if they went to a bigger bin.

32 may be too small for you, but on a normal week I have only one or 2 grocery-store bags of trash which barely cover the bottom of my 30ish-gallon barrel. I do (to my surprise) regularly fill my recycling bin, so I don't regret its size, but I'd hate to have to have another bin of that size sitting empty in my yard for 4-5 days of every week, with one tiny bag in it for another couple days, and then two bags for one night. I hope if they go for big bins they're not a requirement.

I look around town and marvel at the amount of trash every other household seems to generate in a week!

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

The trash trucks have a device on the truck that will cans if they have a bar, which Toter brands do. Though the recycling trucks have one that will grab it from the sidewalk if they line it up perfectly.

It would be nice if they can find a way to accept people can's if the cans comply. I'm one of the people that has Toter brand cans just like city issued recycling versions. Problem is most people who are not complying will not admit they are not due to pride or other reasons and won't respond well to ticketing, so city used cans might be the only way to go from a PR perspective. If that is the case I'll accept it in order to have my neighbors get in compliance.