DSNY trash collection continues amid smoke emergency

Trash collection in New York City will continue amid the city’s smoke emergency, city officials said last week.

As reported by the Staten Island Advance, Deputy Mayor of Operations Meera Joshi said at a morning press briefing that city officials had “no intention of discontinuing” regular trash collection, a statement which Department of Sanitation (DSNY) Deputy Commissioner for Public Affairs and Customer Experience Joshua Goodman later confirmed.

The department has made high-quality masks, such as N95 and KN95, available to all city employees, Goodman said.

The state Department of Labor’s Division of Worker Protection issued its own recommendation to limit outdoor work and activities that require exertion in areas with air quality health advisories, including the five boroughs, reports the Staten Island Advance.

The city’s smoke emergency is a result of the recent Canadian wildfires, which have caused what’s described as the worst air quality in decades.

At 3 p.m. on June 7, Staten Island had an Air Quality Index value of 392, a level that is deemed “hazardous” by the New York Department of Environmental Protection.

Department of Labor officials recommended limits to outdoor labor in fields like farming and agriculture, construction, landscaping, highway maintenance, and other fields that require outdoor heavy-exertion labor.

In a statement to Waste Today, DSNY Press Secretary Vincent Gragnani says visibility was not an issue for waste collection workers and that the department took necessary precautions to protect workers. 

"To help keep them safe, we made masks available to all of the sanitation workers who pick up the 24 million pounds of trash and recycling left at the curb every day. We have tens of thousands of high-quality masks on hand for emergencies such as these," he says.