Mis-bagged yard waste fine?

[nowalmart.livejournal.com]

So our landlord called us this week. It seems he received a $25 citation from the city of Somerville for something involving incorrect trash on our curb (Apologies for not getting the exact description, the landlord spoke with one of my roommates).

The only strange thing on our curb this last week was some bags of leaves in (incorrect) plastic trash bags that the landscaping crew had left from some work done in the backyard. The bags of leaves were left by the trash crew (they were not picked up, and are now back in the backyard).

This raised some questions in my head:
1) No where on the Somerville Environmental Service Guide does it say that you will be fined for putting out improper trash.

2) How can the city fine you if they did not take the trash? It makes sense if they take the trash and then fine you for that, but the garbagemen just skipped over the bags of leaves. It seems this is a "no harm, no foul" sort of situation.

As an aside, the landlord has agreed to pay the fine, since he was the one that hired the landscapers. I did not want to tell him what to do, but I want to tell him to not pay the fine.

Any comments?

Comments

[mrpet.livejournal.com]

Yard waste must be put in brown paper bags or in bins with an official label. Construction waste cannot be thrown out in the curbside trash pickup. I keep telling my landlord this and the people that he hires to do work keep putting the crap out in black plastic bags.

from the link that you posted:

Remember:
1. Yard waste must be kept in paper bags or
barrels marked with “yard waste only” stickers.
These stickers are available FREE of
charge from DPW customer service, as well as
the in the Mayor’s Office, City Hall.
2. Yard waste may also be dropped off at the
DPW yard, Monday– Friday, 8:00AM—
4:00PM, year round. PLASTIC BAGS will NOT
be accepted. Bushes and tree limbs must be
cut and tied in bundles that are not more than
3 feet in length for both pick up and drop-off.

and

We don’t accept building materials such as but not limited to; lumber,
sheet rock, bricks and concrete. For disposal of these items you
would need to contact a private disposal company

[nowalmart.livejournal.com]

Oh, I understand why it was not picked up. I just do not understand the fine.

PLASTIC BAGS will NOT be accepted.

This sentence does not say "In fact, we will even fine you for even trying plastic bags."

[larksdream]

Yeah, but then there's trash sitting on the curb all day. Leaving trash sitting around on the curb is fineworthy, IMO.

[vanguardcdk.livejournal.com]

IMO they probably instituted the fine becuase enough people were improperly putting out yard waste that it wasy causing delays in garbage pickup.

After all, if the garbage guys see plastic bags, they stop the truck and go to pick them up. If they find the plastic bags are incorrect, then that is a wasted stop.
If it happens enough then there will be delays and the city responds with fines.

Again, that's only my guess...I could be totally wrong. :)

[charlwoo.livejournal.com]

It might not have been related to the yard waste at all. Last week, I put out a barrel full of yard waste with an official sticker (the DPW yard lady is really nice by the way) and it wasn't picked up. I called the DPW the next morning, they were quite helpful on the phone and sent someone out to pick it up that day. The barrel was sitting out on the curb for an extra day. No fine, no problem.

Yard waste is chipped and composted, so they can't accept plastic or other non-compostable garbage mixed with the yard waste (the paper bags for yard waste are compostable). However, as far as I know they just refuse to take it if it doesn't meet their criteria. Sometimes they leave a sticker explaining why it was refused.

But... there is quite a bit of household hazardous waste that they won't accept mixed in with normal garbage. Maybe they tossed a few bags of regular trash in the truck and only saw some hazardous waste as a bag was being crushed. Maybe there was a bottle of cleaning fluid or motor oil or something else hazardous mixed in with your garbage. Perhaps one of the landscapers found an old rat bait trap and threw it in one of the trash barrels. Maybe there were inappropriate materials in the recycling bin (although in my case they just left the material in the bin and didn't fine me).

[joyfulkel.livejournal.com]

something similar happened to us a month ago
the city didnt take our recycling (even though it was out in its pretty blue bin), and then fined us for leaving it out.

they refunded it a month later.

wierdos

[roblem.livejournal.com]

It's just yet another hidden tax... What can you do?

New Ordinance?

[artic-monkeys.livejournal.com]

Our comic book group of Alderman were passing new Garbage regulations becuase of Rats. It seems one of the alderman (Marryann) actually had Rats in her own yard before they became motivated to solve the problem. In their typical fashion they probably rolled out the new set of rules and fines without doing a decent job of informing everyone in the community so that we could all work together to help solve the problem. see meeting notes: http://www.ci.somerville.ma.us/CoS_Content/documents/minutes/Committee%20Report%20-%20Rodent%20Control%20-%204-27-06.pdf