Dumpers Mess Up Myrtle

Public waste baskets along Myrtle Avenue in Ridgewood are being abused by area residents who dump their household trash in the receptacles, according to the executive director of a local merchants’ organization, who called on the Department of Sanitation (DSNY) to launch a crackdown.

Ted Renz of the Myrtle Avenue Business Improvement District (BID) recently sent a letter to the DSNY’s Henry Ehrhardt asking for the agency to dispatch enforcement agents to the shopping strip between Cypress Avenue and 60th Lane to catch individuals who place household garbage into the public bins.

“Many of these corners are abused on a regular basis, generally between 6 and 8 a.m. (peak times of abuse), with a significant amount of household waste in each public receptacle,” Renz wrote in the letter, which was forwarded to the Times Newsweekly.

The illegal dumping complicates the efforts of the BID to keep the shopping strip clean, according to Renz. Crews are out on the sidewalk daily from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. to assist the DSNY in sweeping the streets and also removing and replacing garbage bags in the 65 receptacles on Myrtle Avenue between Fresh Pond Road and Wyckoff Avenue.

“Mounting household garbage at the corners is an eyesore which detracts from a pleasant shopping environment,” the BID director wrote. “It also is a signal to potential new store owners and residents—on the relative health of the community—whether or not to invest in that neighborhood, or to keep on looking. First impressions are critical.”

Renz identified six locations where illegal dumping has been most observed. They include the Ridgewood Memorial Triangle, at the northwest corner of Myrtle and Cy- press avenues; the southwest corner of Norman Street and Myrtle Avenue; the northwest and northeast corners of Myrtle Avenue and 60th Lane; the southeast corner of Myrtle Avenue and Weirfield Street; and the northwest corner of Myrtle Avenue and Cornelia Street.

“Moving forward, we need to address this situation as soon as possible to catch these illegal dumpers, publicize the names of those caught and the penalties they incur,” Renz stated in his letter to Ehrhardt.

He also requested that the DSNY restore six-day a week collection at public waste baskets along Myrtle Avenue and in other commercial districts within the confines of Community Board 5.