Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Good morning and welcome to today's New York City Council hearing for the committee. on sanitation and solid waste management. At this time, I would like to remind everyone to silence all electronic devices. Also, at this point, going forward, no one is approach chair, we're ready to begin. >> Good morning everyone and welcome to this uh beautiful uh sunny day uh Monday morning um in the city of New York. Um, and welcome to the fiscal 2027 preliminary budget hearing for the committee on sanitation and solid waste management. My name is Justin Sanchez and I am the chair of the sanitation and solid waste management committee. Today we'll review the Department of Sanitation's fiscal 2027 budget to understand how it addresses the sanitation needs of all New Yorkers. I would like to begin by thanking the men and women of the department of sanitation for their hard work keeping our city clean and livable. When collecting refues in the morning early morning hours, clearing snow from our streets, which we had a lot of this year, uh or managing the city's growing waste export needs, the work of DSNY's workforce is essential to the daily life of every New Yorker. The Department of Sanitation's fiscal 2027 preliminary budget totals approximately $3.1 billion. The preliminary plan includes a number of new needs and adjustments, and the committee looks forward to discussing how these resources are being deployed to address the city's most pressing sanitation challenges. During our hearing today, the committee would like to focus on several key areas, including the department's chronic overtime reliance and whether the preliminary plan takes meaningful steps towards structural reform, the expansion of containerization across the city, including its cost and implementation timeline, waste export cost, and the city's long-term strategy for managing exported waste as the 2026 solid waste management plan is implemented, and lot cleaning operations, and how the department is allocating resources to address vacant law conditions across the five buraus. Over the past year, the committee has conducted active oversight of sanitation operations, including a hearing on the city's engagement around the 2026 solid waste management plan. We also anticipate holding a hearing on street cleanliness in the coming months as maintaining street clean streets remains a top priority for our constituents and this committee. I would like to thank our committee staff for their hard work. our senior fi financial analysts Tanvir Singh, our policy analyst Ricky Chala and Dirk Spencer, our committee council Morgan Barrett and Samia Shell. I would like to thank and welcome acting commissioner Lohan and the men and women of the department of sanitation for the essential work they do every day and I'm looking forward to today's discussion and the committee council will now swear you in. >> Good morning. My name is Morgan Barrett. Will you please raise your right hands? Thank you. Do you affirm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth before this committee and to respond honestly to council member questions? Thank you. You may begin when ready. >> I'd like to also recognize my colleagues who are joining us here today. Uh we start with council member Morano, uh council member Wang, council member Hanife, Council Member Delar Rosa, and council members Carr. Do we have anyone? >> Anyone on Zoom? And we have Council Member Baloney joining us via Zoom. >> Commissioner, please begin when you're ready. >> Great. Thank you. Good morning, Chair Sanchez and members of the Committee on Sanitation and Solid Waste Management. I am Javier Lohan, the acting commissioner of the New York City Department of Sanitation. And I am joined today by Joseph Anteneelli, Deputy Commissioner of Management and Budget, and by Joshua Goodman, Deputy Commissioner of Public Affairs and Customer Experience. I've worked at the Department of Sanitation for 27 years, and even with that level of experience, it can still be a challenge to grasp the enormity of our work. The 10,000 members of service at DSNY are responsible for three primary areas, which I will list and then explain in as much detail as time allows with an emphasis on new innovations and strategic initiatives. Broadly speaking, our three core functions break down to collection, cleaning, and snow removal. Beginning with collection, New Yorkers set out 24 million pounds of residential trash, recycling, and compostable material each day. That's 24 million pounds today, 24 million pounds tomorrow, 24 million pounds the next day, and so on. It is a job that by its nature can never be completed. At the end of our third shift of the day, the next day's materials already waiting at the curb. We want a massive house-to-house operation, traversing every part of the city each day to get this waste off the sidewalks. While collection operations have been at the core of our work for over 140 years, there have been remarkable innovations in just the last few years. We bring trash to the to a network of transfer stations and processing facilities where increasing shares are put to beneficial reuse in the form of recycling, composting, composting, and anorobic digestion. The export of waste out of the city accounts for roughly one quarter of the department's budget and this is a fixed cost that is extremely difficult to adjust. We are making long-term changes though by reducing the amount of waste that cannot be reclaimed. Most notably with our citywide curbside composting program, the largest and easiest composting program in the country. This was long derided by both inside and outside the department as impossible. We got it done by making it simple. No signups, no opt-ins, no special rules or bin restrictions. And this universal universalist approach has worked with record setting tonnage diverted from landfill multiple times last year. While outreach and education around this program will continue for years to come, it is now formally normalized in keeping with local law 89 of 2023, and failure to properly separate this material from trash can result in a fine, just like with traditional recycling. We have knocked on close to 800,000 doors to increase awareness about the program and we are giving more of the finished compost back to New Yorkers than ever before with millions of pounds provided free to the public and compost give back events set to start in early April much earlier than in past years. There is one gap remaining in this program and that is a universal requirement for commercial organic separation. The SNY does not collect waste from businesses, but we do regulate this industry. The expansion of commercial waste zone reform, which I will speak about in more detail later, incentivizes businesses to compost by saving the money. But very few businesses are actually required to compost, unlike all residences. Local law 146 of 2013, which regulates compostable material from businesses, is badly out ofd aligned with the goals of the administration or this council. We strongly urge you to set a single standard for both residential and commercial diversion by updating this law. The other core collection innovation of recent years is of course containerization. For 50 years, New York was the only major city in the developed world where trash wasn't just allowed to be placed directly on the sidewalk. It was in fact required to be placed there. Visitors would come here from all over the world to go at our piles of trash. And New Yorkers were asked to defend this disgusting and outdated practice. In October 2022, we began incentivizing containerization through new rules around waste setout times, pairing this with major changes to DSNY operations and picking up more of the trash far earlier. In the spring of 2024, container rules went into effect for all businesses of every type in New York City, requiring them to get their trash off the streets and into a secure bin. We wrote 70,000 warnings to businesses as this rule went into effect. And we have written over a 100,000 summones since, gaining broad compliance and bringing bins to restaurants, delies, bodegas drugstores boutiques and everywhere else on our commercial corridors. The first containerization requirement for residential buildings in more than 50 years went into effect on November 12th, 2024, requiring all buildings with one to nine residential units to use these bins. This can either be their own or the official New York City bin, which is the cheapest high quality bin available. Starting in June 2026, the New York City bin will be the only bin that 1 to9 unit properties are permitted to use for trash to facilitate safer, cleaner, mechanized collection. This program was designed thoughtfully so that these bins would be by far the cheapest of their quality on the market, around $50. a reasonable responsibility for most New York City property owners and New Yorkers have purchased around 1 million of these bins at www.bins.nyc or at New York City Home Depot locations. Still, in order to meet the needs of certain property owners, DSNY in partnership with the city council created a bin reimbursement program for owners of one and two family homes who qualify for the state or ETAR tax exemption. To date, approximately 9.1 million has been spent on these reimbursements. The bins have fundamentally altered the look and feel of our streets, replacing piles of black trash bags that attracted rats, impeded pedestrians, and generally made New Yorkers feel that no one cared about their neighborhoods. These bins may look like simple pieces of plastic, but they have led to 15 straight months of declining ratings citywide. Sighting citywide, excuse me. About 10 months ago, we took a giant leap forward in waste collection strategies with the start of the Empire bin stationary on street container program in Manhattan Community District 9. Service by new automated sideloading trucks. This is the first European style on street container program in North America. Taking those huge piles of trash bags that are generated by the largest buildings off the streets and instead storing them in secure containers. West Harlem is home to approximately 1100 Empire bins covering more than 80% of their apartment units. Unlike in other parts of the world, the bins are not shared by the entire block. Bins are assigned to a single large building using our density, which had long been thought of the Achilles heel of containerization to our advantage by allowing for greater oversight. Property owners and residents have responded extremely well to this program and the second district has already been announced with planning under way to have Brooklyn Community Board District 2 fully containerized later this year. Funding to continue this program appeared in last year's November plan and we are currently working to estimate cost and timelines for a citywide expansion plan. Collection may seem like a solved problem, particularly considering how much of it happens outside of public view, but it is something we are refining and reinventing each day. Turning to our second core function, cleaning public spaces, we are also continuously expanding our approach. When I began my career, no one was sure which agency was responsible for cleaning median, step streets, underpasses, and other areas of public property in a sustained and ongoing way. a result of a cotch era inter agency memo that has long created confusion about agency roles around cleaning. As a result, DSNY was not then resourced to clean these areas. That began to change a few years ago with the formal recognition of DSNY as the only agency with a dedicated competency around cleaning and program design and funding to match that skill set. Since the creation of the first ever DSNY highway unit in 2023, we have added specialized highway cleaning equipment and implemented important highway safety trainings. We now clean every single highway, the areas that visitors to our city often see first on a regular basis. Another new unit, our targeted neighborhood task force, provides regular cleaning to over 1700 areas that had been left out of prior plans. There are most certainly several in every one of your districts, areas where your constituents are finally seeing results from Snake Road to West 230th Street steps to the Conduit Boulevard. We additionally took management of the city's graffiti removal program, increasing the number of 311 service requests closed by 80%. We are also also using new technology and tactics to streamline public space cleaning. While this has always been a data-driven agency for decades, cleaning condition logs were maintained manually and locally. We have removed barriers between districts and created one single digital log is ACR used across the agency. This allows for far greater pre-planning around chronic conditions and the valuable data produces an ongoing analysis that means more areas of your district service in an even more timely manner. And we have heard concerns from members of this council on two major cleanliness issues. median cleaning and of course dog waste. Pedestrian malls or medians that are not properly weeded and maintained can attract and and catch litter. To address this, we are working with a new mall spraying contract to ensure in a cost-effective way that the grass in these areas does not become overgrown. We expect to spray across the city this spring to avoid summer overgrowth and will notify your offices and community boards as we do so. Before I discuss our dog waist strategy, let me be clear about the issue here. Dog owners know that they have a legal responsibility to pick up dog waste regardless of the weather conditions on the ground. It is irresponsible and just gross to leave this behind anywhere, whether it's a sidewalk, a patch of grass, or a snow pile. At the same time, all property owners are legally required to keep their sidewalks clean, as well as 18 in into the roadway. And this would include removing dog waste from their sidewalks. All 311 complaints related to dogways are investigated daily. And we do issue summones to property owners for dirty sidewalks around and surrounding areas. 8,999 this calendar year alone. Although that was for any kind of dirty sidewalk area, not just dog waste. Summones for dog owners are much more difficult to issue because our enforcement officer would have to catch the owner in the act of leaving a pile behind. We have done many special patrols in areas with high rates of 311 service requests for dog waste and they have yielded almost zero summones. In 2024, we did a three-day stakeout in M Haven that yielded just one summons. Then in 2025, we did special week-long patrols in Washington Heights, Harlem, Morningside Heights, and Flatbush. All in response to 311 service requests, and none of none of them yielded any summones. The chances of someone not picking up after their dog while an enforcement officer is watching is very, very slim. So slim that we issue just two summones for failure to remove K9 waste in 2025. It is clear that people only leave piles behind when they know no one is watching. We have also done and continue to do several ad campaigns and educational outreach on the issue of dog waste. But really, every dog owner knows what they are supposed to do in consideration of their neighbors. They should do the right thing and pick up after the dogs. That said, we are working with members of this council to add dog waste bag dispensers to some of our litter baskets. This dispenser pilot is now underway with dispensers to fix to our new better bin corner litter baskets. Unlike the old green wire basket baskets which force New Yorkers to look at trash all day and leak garbage onto our corners, the new baskets have no holes for the first eight inches in much smaller openings throughout. They are harder to misuse and take longer to fill up and are far easier for our sanitation workers to service. This is in addition to the modular design that means only the least expensive part ever needs to be replaced. We appreciate our council partners who have purchased better bins over the la past two fiscal years with the discretionary funds. We are excited to work with your offices in the next year to keep better bins rolling out and we are proud today to be servicing baskets at the highest level ever. Whereas for decades, litter basket service was the subject of political negotiations. The highest level is now baseline. Yet another innovation in cleaning. Last among our three core functions is something we all that all new council members have already learned a great deal about. Snow removal. We train year round for snow and as discussed at last month's snow oversight hearing, this was a challenging winter with the most snow in a decade and a top 10 blizzard. But it was also a winter that has bred innovation at the department. Heading into next year, we will continue to look to improve, including by expanding our fleet of brine flushing trucks by refining the brand new geocoding of pedestrian infrastructure and by formalizing successful pilot expansions of the emergency snow shoveler program. Given that we spoke about snow at great length at a recent oversight hearing, I will leave this topic there for now except that it relates to budget. It relates to budget. The city's snow budget is unusual among municipal budget lines in that the formula for determining is set by the city charter outside the bounds of political negotiations. That formula calls for budgeting an average of the actual amount spent on snow removal the last five years. And giving given the low snow totals over the last several seasons, the budget has gen generally been in the 80 to hund00 million range for the last several years. This winter required an adjustment of approximately hundred million dollars to reflect spending thus far made in the January plan. Earlier I mentioned commercial w zones. The program be begin began began implementing in lo uh under local law 199 of 2019 to reform the commercial waste hauling system by establishing new safety standards for workers in the commercial carding industry, improving services for businesses, increasing diversion rates, and reducing vehicle miles traveled as well as harmful emissions from waste hauling vehicles. When fully implemented, we are looking at about 12 million fewer miles traveled by commercial carting vehicles. And making good on the promise from when this program was created, businesses will pay less for the collection of recyclables and compostable material than they do for trash at a citywide average of 32% less for recycling and 18% less for compostable material. That means businesses will have a meaningful financial incentive to separate their waste properly. This program is a major change for everyone of the city's 200,000 businesses, and we are committed to rolling it out thoughtfully with detail and culturally competent outreach. The program is now fully operational in five of the city's 20 zones, and we will complete full citywide implementation by the end of 2027. Staffing for the DSNY Bureau of Commercial Waste will continue to expand to meet the needs of this program over the next 20 months. The expansion of DSNY regulatory and enforcement authority is not restricted to commercial way zones since April 2023. Sanitation has been the lead agency on enforcement of the city's laws around street vending. Our sanitation police officers enforce these laws where they focus on cleanliness and pedestrian access and they conduct routine enforcement operations rooted in the belief that all New Yorkers across every neighborhood in every burrow deserve clean, safe sidewalks. I have mentioned different forms of camera technology multiple times today. And one of the most successful recent deployments of camera technology by the Department of Sanitation is our illegal dumping program. With a network of 334 cameras citywide, set in places that illegal dumpsters considered out of the way. We are now busing people for this crime hundreds of times every year, impounding their vehicles and issuing summones that start at $4,000. New Yorkers can even send a video to illegal dumping tips at dsny.nyc.gov and potentially get paid. We have issued about a dozen summones to people brought to our attention via this tip line in the last year. We also continue to seek authority up in Albany to operate cameras on our mechanical brooms to encourage compliance with alternate side parking regulations. We thank the council for your partnership in passing a home rule message support. I know this was a tremendous amount of information. After more than a quarter century of DSNY, I'm still amazed at the breadth and depth of our work. We are in every community every day and if the time ever came that we didn't show up, people would notice immediately. Fortunately for Hello, I don't know if the mic maybe I spoke too much. Can you try this? Okay, I'll try this mic. Okay, I'll try this. Can you hear me now? >> Nope. >> The mic's not Oh, there it goes. Okay. >> Okay. Fortunately, thanks to the work the council and the administration do to keep this agency running that they will never come. I will now provide a more detailed budgetary update. The preliminary budget includes a 2.25 billion in expense funds in fiscal year 2026 and 2.08 billion in fiscal year 2027, reflecting increases of 261 million and 38 million respectively from the budget adopted last June. The fiscal year 2026 budget includes $1.33 billion for personal services to support a total budgeted headcount of 9,625 full-time positions, including 7,957 uniform positions and 1,668 civilian positions and $95.4 million for other than personal services or OTPS. The SNY's fiscal year 2027 preliminary capital budget includes 3.26 26 billion in capital funding in the 10-year plan, $1.09 billion of which is for garages and facilities, $2.04 billion for equipment, 59.28 million for IT, and 770.22 million for solid waste management infrastructure. The capital budget includes funding for several major facility projects, including 488 million for or fun in funding for the construction of a new garage for Bronx districts 9, 10, and 11 with demolition. 284 million in funding for the construction of a new garage for Queens District 1, which is slated to begin design later this year. Upgrades to the facility that serves the home for Bronx District 12 garage, which has an overall budget of 52.5 million, and began construction this year. and the $10 million finishing touches on the 223 million buildout for the brand new home for Stan All in District 1 and three, which is slated to be completed this year. That project along with the new BK3 means we will be opening three new districts at two buildings this calendar year. A rare milestone for this department and a sign of this administration's serious investment in the safety and well-being of sanitation workers and the neighborhoods they serve. Thank you for your advocacy of a cleaner, more sustainable New York City. And we look forward to taking your questions. >> Thank you, Commissioner. Uh before we continue, I just want to recognize my following colleagues that have joined us. Uh, Council Member uh, Pyina Sanchez, uh, Council Member Vernikov, uh, Council Member Hanks, uh, Council Member Brewer, Council Member Schulman, and Council Member Lee, and, uh, walking this way is Council Member Hankerson. >> Uh, so, uh, in the interest of also my colleagues time, uh, the way that, uh, I will structure this is we will start with the headcount and overtime questions. uh then I will turn it over to my colleagues and then we will finish up uh with uh remaining questions. Uh let's get started. Uh so the uh fiscical year 27 preliminary budget includes uh 9,91 positions with overtime budgeted at 257.9 million uh compared to 204.7 million in fiscal year 25. Given that uh what is the department's current filled staffing level compared to these budgeted positions and what is the vacancy rate expressed as uh a percentage and how does this compare to the past three fiscal years? >> So DSNY is currently staffed for all uniform positions and we're nearly at the full civilian attrition headcount with a vacancy rate of a little over 3%. Um, this is in line with previous fiscal years. >> Uh, excuse me. What percentage of DSNY's 1.3 1.344 billion uh personal ser person personal services budget is allocated to uh the budgeted overtime versus regular wages and how has this percentage changed over the past five fiscal years uh given that actual fiscal year overtime was 204.7 million. >> Sure. So um 250 the 2579 million it represents about 19% of the 1.344 billion PS budget which also includes $160 million of snow over time. Um and that percentage of overtime fluctuates due to the variability of snow and winter weather events. Um sometimes we have um predicted weather events where we don't get the actual snowfall but we have to prepare for it. So that's a factor into the snow overtime. And then last year 204.7 million in overtime represented about 16% of the total year NPS budget. What is the uh average overtime hours performed by a uniformed worker annually and what is the percentage of workers that exceed 200 hours of overtime per year? So for fiscal year 25 uh the average uh overtime hours per uniformed employee was about 225 hours per person. Um and then for snow overtime is was an additional 34 39 hours per uniform worker annually and we are still working on getting the actual percentage of that 200 but we'll we'll definitely get that to you chair. >> Okay. Uh also would like to recognize that we've been joined by council member Chanel Thomas Henry. Uh what steps is uh the department taking to reduce reliance on overtime without compromising essential services such as waste collection, stone removal, street cleaning. >> Sure. So I have weekly meetings with my deputy commissioner of management and budget which is Joan Tanelli. Um we go over top overtime earners list for uniform dent civilian. Um, one of the things that I implemented also um this recent fiscal year is that uh every week uniform unit heads have to go over um within their area of work the number of um budgeted posts and when they go over they have to verify that they authorize that for whatever reason. For example, sometimes we have blockades you know sometimes we work with NYPD to have blockade um operations there. So that's something that we're not really anticipating from event to event. Um sometimes we have transport of a vehicles because the nature of our operation requires us to shift equipment around. So those are things that for example that we work with my uniform chiefs and they have to verify with the bureau commands and make sure that they are not going over that. So that's one of the processes that I've implemented in my tenure here. And um have you guys done a costbenefit analysis comparing, you know, the per hour cost of overtime versus uh you know time and a half versus uh the fully loaded cost of just bringing on additional full-time staff. >> Sure. So one of the things with the the nature of our operation which is you know unique compared to some of the other uniform agencies is that our our staffing is very fluid. So you could be assigned to a district in Queens, but you could be going to a district in Brooklyn or Manhattan depending on where the needs are. Um, so that's a little bit tough sometimes to to become the the full-time post versus overtime. But there's also posts that are just seasonal in nature. Um, so as I mentioned, the transporting of vehicles, um, uh, stadium cleaning. So sometimes when we have events at like the Barlay Center, things like that, we book extra personnel. Yankee Stadium, cleaning City Field, we book extra personnel to clean the perimeters just to make sure everything's tidied up. So those in nature wouldn't require us to hire full-time positions. Um, as I mentioned, you know, blockades, salt receiving is another one. Um, you know, you know, when we're in snow season, we have to book extra personnel to receive the salt and put it in our salt sheds. And then there's functions by nature that and you know obviously want to thank the council um when we have council member funded um cleaning whether it's litter baskets you know mechanical brooms those are those are not year round positions so those really are ones that we kind of just in nature over time budgeted post that you know benefits benefit us to continue that. >> And what is your uh employee turnover rate and how does this compare to other uniform city agencies? So our uniform staff uh member the 12 month 12-month turnover rate is approximately 7% which is roughly the same from year to year and our civilian staff members uh rolling 12 month turnover rate is about 9%. Um I can't really speak to the comparison of the other uniformed agencies right now. Chair >> uh what percentage of new hires remain after a year um after three years? So right now we don't really have those stats available, but I can tell you it's very very low. Um especially after the year, the three years we're looking at that, but um we really don't have a challenge with retention as far as uniform ranks go. >> Uh does, uh the department track or monitor excessive overtime uh usage by employees? Um and have there been a percentage of workers that have been flagged um as potential overtime abuse? So, as I mentioned before, I go over um with my deputy commissioner of management and budget the top overtime earners list. Um and that's one of the those are the init that's the initial round of review. Um after that, then if somebody's a higher percentage than really what I noticed compared to the rest of the bureau, the deputy commissioner of that bureau has to then respond as to why that's going so high. And I've rectified a few of them. Um a lot of it nothing obviously legal. It's more of just you know mostly responding to like emergencies for building maintenance trade titles when we see something like that. Sometimes it's IT titles where we have patching that, you know, we have to have people on standby for we can't do it during the week. So things like that. Um and then anything that is flagged, we are do immediately work with. We have an internal investigation team who always communicates with DOI on anything major like that. But I haven't had anything particular as far as you know flags specifically. Uh and so going deeper into the previous mayor's directive on overtime, um is there an understanding of what percentage um and reduction in overtime spending uh the department achieved since the uh previous mayoral directive was implemented um and how does this compare to the targeted reduction? So, um, one of the things that we, uh, had recently been doing, and I and I think that's going to continue, is we were meeting with the budget director, uh, and the first deputy mayor and going over the over our overtime targets. Um, everything was um, justified in the terms of why we went over. Um, sometimes it was, you know, um, holiday weeks, for example, um, fourth of July of this current fiscal year fell on a Friday. Normally on a h on a Monday holiday, we have enough enough days uh the following the holiday where we can catch up so to speak when we go into a Friday, you know, the Friday holiday, we have very limited time. So we intentionally went ahead of it ahead of time and staffed um workers to work on Sunday to catch up with the recyclables of the holiday. So things like that, you were all justified and we went over with budget director. >> Awesome. Uh, I'd like to recognize uh my colleague uh council member for joining us. >> Um, what specific remediation plans has the department submitted to OM to address any instances of excessive overtime expenditures? >> Want to pass it on to a deputy commissioner of management and budget. >> So, I know the commissioner mentioned that there were monthly meetings with the budget director and uh the first deputy mayor under the prior administration. We also continue to have staff level meetings with the office of management and budget um conducted by myself and my team and we actually go over in detail and provide daily overtime information. So while there's no specific remediation plan, we certainly talk about the day-to-day challenges um and justify all of it and we've really had no no issues on that front. Uh could you speak to a little bit uh by what percentage has the uh department reduced uh its overtime budget allocations from fiscal year 25 um to the fiscical school year 27 plan level? >> Well, I think we we you know we obviously always plan to reduce overtime and limit our overtime as much as possible. Um it's just it's the dayto-day things that come up that have really created that challenge. So while we do have that planned level of 185 million I think in blue skies if we don't have snow and things go well though you know that can be an achievable number but I think just the realities of the field conditions that we have uh make it very difficult although we do continue to monitor it daily. >> Um and just for clarity can you uh just define and categorize what the emergency overtime versus non-emergency overtime uh is? >> Sure. So, well, there's the main emergency overtime is always snow. Um, and when we're in snow operations, we categorize our overtime as snow overtime. And then when we're not in snow operations, it's just categorized as regular overtime. >> Thank you so much. Uh, I'm going to pass it over to, uh, Council Member Lee for some, uh, questions on finance. >> Hi, good morning. Um so going into the chief savings officer initiatives um has DSNY designated a chief savings officer or equivalent position as proposed by Mayor Mamani to identify the efficiencies and cost savings opportunities and also what percentage of this position's time is dedicated solely uh to savings initiatives versus other administrative duties. >> Good morning chair. Thank you for the question. Um so yeah I I have identified a chief savings officer which is deputy commissioner Joan Tenelli our management and budget um deputy commissioner um and as far as percentage you want to talk about? >> Yeah I mean I don't know that I could necessarily put a percentage on it but it has been a heavy part of what we've been working on as we work towards the March 20th uh deadline. And how much authority do you have uh to implement the cost reduction measures without going to OM uh or external entities or does that have to go through? >> We it has to go work its way through the process. >> Okay. Um and what specific cost-saving targets or benchmarks has um been established for FY27 and what percentage reduction I know you're still working on it, but if at all uh what percentage reduction in operating expenses or improvement in operational efficiency do these targets represent? Sorry, this is a little question. And what mechanisms are in place to track progress towards these goals on a quarterly basis with um transparent reporting to the council? >> So the targets that were set was 1.5% for this year and 2.5% for next year, which was the standard target given to agencies. >> Um and I mean in terms of of benchmarks, again, it really depends on on where we land on what what initiatives um that we work out, but you know, we'll certainly have monitoring tools in place for whatever gets decided. And as you just mentioned, I know that it's tough because when there's a lot of snow um over time and all their costs tend to add up um more so for sanitation, I would say, than any other department. So, we thank you for all the work you're doing. Um and just uh how how does DSNY ensure that cost savings measures pursued by uh yourself do not compromise service quality? Because obviously we want to make sure it doesn't compromise on that. um public safety or regulatory compliance and what percentage of proposed savings initiatives have been rejected due to potential negative impacts on operations. Um because that's something we would want to know as well as what cannot be done because it sacrifices too much on services. Um and what oversight mechanisms exist to evaluate uh whether implemented savings have unintended consequences on agency performance or public service delivery. So, I think a lot of that we won't really know until we, you know, work our way through the process and have the actual initiatives that the administration would like to pursue. >> Okay, great. And we look forward to the reports. Um, and then two more questions around one is abandoned vehicle removal and the other is one of our favorites which is illegal dumping enforcement. So for the abandoned vehicle removal, PMMR shows abandoned vehicle removals increased 35% from 7,337 in the first four months of FY25 to 9,884 and26. Um with nearly 10,000 abandoned vehicles, they were removed from the city streets over the reporting period. So what is the cost per vehicle removed and what is the total annual budget for this program and how does this compare to the cost of vehicles remaining on the streets? So, um, as far as abandoned vehicles removed um right now we just entered into a contract with four additional vendors. >> Um, so, and then, you know, we've had, um, discussions with those vendors and we're sending out uh, letters to anybody, any lean holders or property owners when it comes to direct vehicles. Um the initial fee is about $150 uh for the initial toll. Um and then there's about a $25 storage fee for the first few days and then that escalates a bit after a few more days. Um that's that's only um that will only be imposed if the if the owner actually comes to reclaim the the vehicle. Otherwise um the vehicle is then discarded and crushed by the der vehicle um vendor. Do you have a number in the budget? Oh, well, I'm sorry. We'll have to get just get back to you on the budget number down there. >> And just out of curiosity, was that just through a normal RFP process? >> Correct. Okay. Yeah, normal RFP process. >> Okay. Um, PMMR also shows revenue from abandoned vehicles is budgeted conservatively at $100,000 annually despite actual collections of 61.3 million in FY24 and 57.9 million in FY25. Um, so why is there such a large discrepancy between the budgeted and acrual revenue and what accounts for the vehicle auction salvage value volatility? >> So I think there may have just been a discrepancy in the numbers. Um, the first number that you cited is actually $57,913 not >> 57,9 Okay. >> Yeah. And the second one was $61,256. So they're they're within the budgeted ranges >> of 100,000. Okay. Thank you for that clarification. Um, considering the large increase in vehicle removals, do you think, and this may be based on the other numbers, budget can support continued removals and enforcement? Um, and are there additional vehicles that could be removed if more resources were budgeted? >> So, I could just take that. So, um, there's there's two types of vehicles. Um, there's the derelic vehicle, which has to meet a certain criteria. has um essentially the vehicle has to be valued of less than 200 200 $2,250. We have a criteria and a policy that we follow, our field supervisors follow. And then there's the rotation tow program which NYPD uh handles which is basically anything above 2250 or anything with vehicle plates. Um so >> wait, the car that's sorry, just to clarify, so the car is valued at 2250 or >> less less than 2250 less than 22, right? has to have uh the main criteria is it can't have any plates. >> Um if it has plates then it's not deemed derelict. Um so it can't have plates and then there's certain criteria like if the vehicle is burnt out, has severe damage the you know the the type of vehicle. So there's different criteria in order for us to deem it as derelict. Um if it's deemed derelic, then it goes into um we work with our vendors that I mentioned before and then they bring it to their facility and we send out a letter to um the lean holder or property owner available. If it's a rotation tow um NYPD will take that vehicle and they have vendors. Um we do monthly tag and tow um operations with NYPD because a lot of times what happens is we'll have an area where we get complaints on and there's derelic vehicles and then there's not derelic vehicles. So, in order for us to be more efficient and not, you know, just take some vehicles and not the other, we work closely with NYPD who's been a great partner, either the local precinct or we have the vehicle recovery team, um, that works with us on trying to remove some of these vehicles. >> Great. And I trust there's a way you have to figure out what's der because I'm just saying I had my 93 Camry, which I drove till it had 265,000 miles on it. So, it may not look great from the outside, but the engine may still be good. But, um, okay. Okay, so moving on really quickly to illegal dumping enforcement. Um, PMMR shows illegal dumping enforcement improvements, which is great. Uh, 15% more summons issued from 246 to 283 and 80% more vehicles impounded from 101 to 182. Nearly 50% of the 417 total impounded in all of FY25. Um, what is the total number of illegal dumping cameras deployed? I think it was 337 as of FY25, correct? And what is the conviction/fine collection rate for violations caught on camera? >> So, um, we really don't have those numbers as far as the conviction rate. Um, that that's processed to the office of administrative trials and hearings oath. Um, but I I can say, um, as far as legal dumping cameras, u, first I want to thank the council for their partnership because a lot of these are put up um, with funding, council member discretionary funds. Um, one of the things that we actually did this in my my current tenure is um, we were getting a lot of cameras that had no hits, meaning that we weren't getting any any any impounds or summones. >> Um, we had a few council members where we worked on because it is some money to move the cameras. So, we moved the cameras and we saw a substantial increase um, as as you mentioned, but you know, as far as calendar year goes, we from calendar year 24 to calendar year 25, there was a 62% increase in impounds. Um, and then summones, we had a a 49% increase in summones. So, I think that's something that we're exploring. Um, we are working with um a vendor right now. It's a little premature, but I I'm I'm I'm finding it that hopefully it'll be successful where we have mobile cameras and we can maybe deploy them in areas, but once we get more details on that, we have to test it first. Um, obviously be I think a great tool in our arsenal to to to stop some of this illegal dumping. Um, and what is the average fine amount for illegal dumping violations and what percentage of fines are actually collected? And how do you track repeat offenders and what enhanced penalties exist for habitual violators? And just out of curiosity, on a personal note, how has technology or lack of technology helped or hurt that endeavor? So as far as tech you mean technology as far as identifying the vehicles or >> right or just uh right the cameras uh and how you guys are tracking it. >> So the the the cameras have an LPR license plate reader which um has been very very helpful in helping us identify um if there's a vehicle involved because that that's the only way we consider something illegal dumping if it's ve material thrown out from a vehicle. Um, and as far as the the fines, it's about a $4,000 fine um if we catch somebody and impound their vehicle, plus the impound fee and the cleanup fee. >> Okay. And what is the annual revenue generated from illegal dumping fines and vehicle empoundment fees? And how does this compare to the cost of operating the actual illegal dumping enforcement program? Right. >> Big binder. Try to find it here. >> Oh, he's looking for it now, but maybe we just get back to you rather than >> No, that's fine. Um, and this is definitely an issue we've seen all across um areas of eastern Queens, Southeast Queens in my district as well. So, we appreciate all your efforts on this. So, thank you and thank you, Chair. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. Uh, now I'd like to uh pass it over to Council Member Carr. >> Thank you, Chair Commissioner. Always a pleasure to see you. Um, I want to thank you for, you know, your responsiveness uh to me personally during the latest storm and and the removal operations. Appreciate that from you and your team. Um, but I do want to review a little bit um of the situation from that period, particularly as it relates to the coming budget. um you know our delegation along with the the chair of this committee sent a letter over with some questions in advance of this hearing and I want to focus in on a couple of them in particular you know how the department determines its allocation of resources um there's been a lot of discussion of this over the years lane miles is it land area is it population what should it be and to what extent that permits you to have flexibility to respond to real-time conditions and so that's my first question is what is the the formula for general resource deployment. And then you know what, if any ability does that leave you to rearrange that in advance of a coming storm, >> particularly when forecasts indicate certain parts of the city will be impacted harder than others and and how did that play out with that recent storm uh from last month? >> Sure. Um so as far as a snow operations go, the initial um our main focus obviously is going to be um spreading salt spreading operations and plowing operations. It's all determined by as you mentioned before um there's uh mileage and then there's lane miles and that's all allocated. Um, and we try to have um, it's a general rule of thumb depending on the type of for like plows, it's like 8 to 12 miles per sector. Um, but we always look for efficiencies every uh, snow uh, after every snow season to see what worked and did it work. Um, as far as salt spreading operation, it's a little higher. It's probably like 18 to 20 miles. And that's because, you know, we have um, less salt spreaders than plows. Um, so that's all how we break down the the plow uh plow plans and the spreader plans. As far as the, as you mentioned, so storm lake, you know, the one we had um last month, one of the things that I did, and you know, I'm glad I did it, is we have a requirements contract, which is a few vendors that we've have every year um that has the ability to give us extra resources such as skid steers, front end loaders, dump trucks, and then tow trucks. the tow truck contracts we always activate generally just because if we get anybody impeding us on the roadway we just move the vehicles over and get the plows in. So that was one that was one contract that's it's really easy to essentially just call because you know you're always going to you could always use them. The one thing that I you know I I think what allowed me to kind of have extra resources available was the emergency contracts. So the emergency the if you recall the governor declared a state of emergency the Saturday before the storm. Um I then took the opportunity obviously got approval from the deputy mayor of operations to start initiating approval for emergency contracts. The emergency contracts allows me to expand a little farther further as far as number of resources. And then we deploy we we actually did call in extra contractors. Um so we had over about 500 over 500 pieces on average between the requirements contract and the emergency contract and those were the resources that we immediately um deployed once we started seeing some of the issues in Staten Island um as we all know. So, I think that's a good segue to to my next point because uh you know, Staten Island, I think, gets the short end of that stick on the lane miles equation, but it doesn't take into account the difficulty of the topography and the fact that we're not on a grid system the way, you know, much of the rest of the city is. And so, I think what we saw in that recent storm was uh the longer it took to get to us, the more difficult the job was at the back end. Um, and so I think that raises the the point about the equipment that you're kind of alluding to, which is that you have to rely on these contracting situations, these opportunities. Um, and is there not uh a chance now that we've kind of been through this recent storm to do some acquisition on behalf of the department so that you're less reliant on those emergency contractors? >> Sure. And and those and those are one of the conversations that we've had um internally um with, you know, obviously my deputy mayor and and OM on that. Um we you know after after the storm we are we did an after action and we're going to have to do a after snow season after action just because every snow season obviously brings um challenges and things that we obviously want to improve on. And one of the things that we are internally talking about is you know those areas that you're mentioning some of the hill blocks and and things that we know that if we get that amount of snow we will continue to have challenges. So, um, we are there's different things again like we're talking about maybe, um, doubling up some sectors, using equipment like front end loaders in there on the onset. So, I think we want to be a little bit more agile and and we have the we have right now the equipment. Um, I think just looking at the terrain, um, the narrow streets, things like that. Obviously, one of the biggest factors also that when it comes to snow operations, it's the nature of down events. you know, it's snow equipment that's out there and the the conditions and you know, assault obviously corrods everything. So, taking that into account, we are looking at that closely and that's one of the things we're definitely making adjustments for, not only in Staten Island, but in other areas. Um, you know, there's always areas across the city we could always improve service time and that's definitely one of the things we're looking at this year. >> And chair, if I could just ask one quick question just to round Sure. >> Thank you. And so, just I appreciate that. I look forward to working with you to in aid of that goal. And then last, unrelated, is uh I understand the department's been undertaking an internal investigation with respect to the organics composting facility and the smell effects that it's having on nearby neighborhoods, in particular the town of Travis. Uh can you let me know when you expect that to conclude and is that considering things like capital improvements to the site that could potentially mitigate that nuisance? >> Sure, absolutely. Yeah, and that's one thing we're working closely with DEC on. uh we've been engaged with the EC uh in the last you know year or so on that and um one of the things are we are um working with some capital improvement upgrades on that. Do you want to speak about what is we have in the budget for the Senon compost facility? >> We haven't final. Okay. But we are working on finalizing the number for uh upgrading the facility and because of the the compost facility used to be just the yard wastist and now with the program we're accepting coal collection of food waste and yard wast >> and it's growing. >> It's growing. Correct. >> Thank you commissioner. Thank you chair. >> Thank you. >> Thank you council member Carr. I think uh based on this is a good time just to talk about um some budget transparency specifically the poolled versus the burrow allocations. Um, so this the department's budget structure consolidates most of its operational funding into citywide program areas rather than burrow specific allocations. This makes it difficult for the council to assess uh whether resources are being distributed equally equitably across neighborhoods. It is Monday. I can't speak. I don't know what's going on. Um I know I need more coffee. um what a percentage of the department's um fiscal 27 operating budget is allocated to specific burrow operations versus pulled into citywide/general program areas. So the the the pool versus borrow allocation um I think for for DSNY I think why it's why it's structured that way is actually plays a benefit um in a sense of I'll give you for example um targeted neighborhood task force operation right so there's about 38 sanitation workers that we assign daily um and there's 1700 locations citywide that we have to clean right um if we are structuring those those heads for each district specifically and now we don't move them if some areas don't need cleaning every month. Some of them need cleaning every two months depending on you know the weather plays a factor in the cold weather people apparently don't like to dump which is helpful for us but in those cases then we would move them around more fluidly and I think that's a benefit for us to continue to have that structure. Um, and the other things that I I you know I'm very excited about and I mentioned in my testimony, but I want to go into it a little bit more um is that we have shifted our operation as far as identifying cleanliness um issues across the city by um leveraging our internal um we have an an internal field data collection application that the supervisors all have on their phones. the super the superintendents and the chiefs at the burrows have on their desktop and we've our our uh analytics team has done a great job of creating dashboards on these entries and seeing where these conditions are because you know relying on 311 data obviously I think everybody would agree it's not the best use of identifying cleanliness issues because somebody in the neighborhood may not complain a lot doesn't mean the neighborhood doesn't need resources so I think this shift of having that approach plus having 311 data in there is going to play uh benefits for us to be able to allocate resources more efficiently. But I think having that flexibility of having the resources across the the city and not just designated to one district I think is beneficial for all neighborhoods. >> Uh beyond that system that you just mentioned uh does the department find other ways to internally track or allocate pulled resources to bureau specific operations? Uh are there any accounting systems that are used to ensure equitable distribution? >> Sure. Um so that is all there's a few things. So we have um the uh collections which are um we we kind of work on those we call them productivity targets um on a year round every every year we make adjustments to the to that program and then each district is allocated a certain amount of um truck shifts depending on the day of the week. Um, and that and that's all driven by tonnage and productivity. Um, and then we have the the cleanliness resources that I mentioned, TNT, PCI, and then litter baskets. And then a lot of those are adjusted depending on if we're seeing any issues across the city. Um, and we have an internal um application called smart. So in there we have what we call utilization. in the utilization snapshot which I again this is another thing that I've done with my uniform chiefs is where we go over a weekly snapshot of utilization and seeing um are the resources adequate um our chief of cleaning looks at things all the time and he always asks for additional resources in certain areas where we're seeing issues and then those adjustments are made so you know we have a really good um tool that tracks all these uh resources and we make adjustments you know weekly or even daily sometimes when we know something's, you know, coming up ahead of us. >> Uh with these systems, uh how does the current structure uh allow the council's ability or impact the council's ability, if you will, to hold the sanit the department accountable for burough level performance and spending and like ability to identify disparities in service levels across neighborhoods or advocate for increased resources um in underserved areas. >> Sure. So I think there's a few areas there. Um so you know we have um some of external reporting. So we have a report that we submit to the council on litter basket service. Um so that's one way that obviously the council can use to obviously um give input on where they're seeing gaps um you know the MMR PMR other areas. is I mean that's not at a district level but I think obviously when we're seeing those kinds of issues then you know obviously happy to work with anybody in the council if they're seeing any issues um you know 311 data is another one where we can see if there's any issues. Um we have seen a decline um year-over-year as far as you know over phone litter basket complaints which is um which is great because those are one of the metrics that we want to make sure that we continually either keep flat or decline. a decline in litter basket service. Over phone litter basket complaints are one of the things that we're finding to be successful um across most of the council districts. >> Could you um give us an understanding of which burrows have the highest rates of uh misolctions per a thousand residents, uh street cleanliness complaints per capita, uh litter basket overflow complaints, and average response time to 301 service requests? So, as far as um the the highest rate per capita of 30 conditions, which is at eight per 10,000 residents, Manhattan had the highest amount for FY25. And then um as far as um street sweeping complaints um which you know it's it's the highest but I think it's actually not that bad with um is Brooklyn had the highest per capita rate of street sweeping complaints with two per 10,00 residents. And then uh let's see here. Dirty conditions um the average time to resolve was one day and then dirty conditions um was on an average time of 3 days to resolve in FY25. But these are one of the things that we look at internally the SLA times and we always want to stay above 90 95% obviously um we want to respond to you know residents um complaints as timely as possible. So those are one of the things that we track as far as um you know resolving these issues. >> Uh does the department also track cost per resident or cost per ton metrics by bureau? Um and if you do uh do the metrics reveal anything about resource allocation equity? >> No, right now we do not track those two metrics. Um but you know our resources are b are basically allocated on um more of just the productivity program. As I mentioned, we have a an agreement with the sanitation workers union um which is to making sure that we have um enough productivity and then we make those adjustments on targets truck shifts every fiscal year with them. >> Uh what is the ratio of uniform sanitation workers uh by per thousand residents by burrow? Are there any significant disparities that correlate with service quality metrics? >> No. So, our current headcount um we're budgeted as far as uniform personnel where we're budgeted for 7,96 uniform um uh sanitation workers, supervisor, superintendent, and chiefs. Um I think our budgeted number is a little under 7,000, >> right? >> No, sanitation workers. >> Sanitation workers is a little >> Yeah, it's a little 7,000. Um I think one of the things as far as um we do what's called a staffing parody analysis every year. Um and what we do is we take the we call them post quotas. So the post quotas have what we should have for collection operations and then after that we take actuals of everything that we had throughout the year. So, the litter basket quotas, um, TNT, PCI, and then we go into any, you know, things that aren't targeted per se, as I mentioned before, things like transport blockades, and then we then roll those all up into a really in-depth analysis, and then we have what we think the headcount should be per district. Um, the one thing I just want to point out is that as our our staffing structure is very fluid where just because a district has let's say a 100 sanitation workers assigned to them in the district doesn't mean that those 100 sanitation workers are only going to work in that district. They have the ability to be sent out of town we call it. So you can as I mentioned before you can go from one district to another. Um, or you know we can go and they can work night shifts. So there's a lot of fluidity in that sense which makes it easier for us. we're not um boxed into a number in each district. >> Uh building on that, what specific mechanisms exist within the department's budget and operational planning to address service equity concerns raised by council members uh especially if they represent underserved districts. >> Sure. So, um we have a few external facing tools um that allow the public to see, you know, DSNY's activity in progress. So um everybody's familiar with plan YC which was heavily used this snow season. That's one. Uh sweepenyc is another um external application tool that um the public can use to see if their street was you know swept at the time they were supposed to. So that's very effective tool. Um you have the PMMR and the MMR and then you have just open data which we have a lot of data sets in there that the public or anybody can look to see um you know what's on there. As far as regular reporting, um we have the report on street cleanliness um which is uh submitted twice a year. Litter basket service which is submitted twice a year. We have our burrowbased snow plans which we have one draft and then one final report per year. Um and then we have various reports related on fleet. So those are some of the things that you know the public and the council can use to you know identify any gaps or any issues as far as um DSY resources go. Uh given that there is already so much data already available, um does the uh department uh or would the department be open to um alternative reporting mechanisms that could help improve transparency like quarterly reports on service metrics and resource deployment by bureau? public dash public dashboards showing real-time allocation of trucks, workers, and equipment by district or annual reporting on cost per ton collected and cost per resident served by the bureaus. >> Sure. I I think um my my goal is always to be as transparent as possible. I think the administration is as well. Um you know, obviously there's a resource constraint there. Um you know, making sure that we have the adequate resources to make sure that something is possible. But I think um the more that we can be transparent and explain why things are done a certain way with our agency I think can only help us and has helped us in certain regards um so I'm always open to obviously having additional reporting mechanisms or things like as you mentioned chair um obviously that something that will be productive right um and I'm sure we can work together on finding what what those areas are and where you're seeing it and seeing what be great for beneficial use. I appreciate that. And just to put a little bow uh on this section, um if a burrow is constantly underperforming on key metrics um like cleanliness scores or collection reliability or response times, uh how does the sanit department's uh poolled budget structure facilitate or hinder the ability to direct additional resources to improve performance? >> So I I think um that does help us. So, we have um we have uh weekly meetings. Um the chief of department who's with me today um has weekly meetings with the burough commands. Uh each there's seven zones. Each burough command comes down with the district superintendent and they go over stats. Um we go over 311 stats, we go over and those 311 stats are over from little baskets 30 conditions, enforcement, you know, stats, things like that, productivity measures. Um and then those th the b the this chief of department goes over which eat each burrow and seeing like where are these issues why are you having chronic complaints you know what are we doing to fix it with the existing resources and sometimes we find that maybe additional resources may be necessary uh are obviously we want to try to keep things internal with each burrow and that's where I think the poolled oper approach is definitely effective for us so if we have an area we we need more resources at least for you know a certain amount of time um we'll try those out and seeing if that works. Obviously, we don't want to impact any other district. We don't want to take from one district, give it to another, and then we're having issues. So, that's one of the things that we do every week. I think it's proven to be very effective. Um, and I think we learn a lot obviously because we're not always on the ground. So, but the district superintendents are and I think them um voicing the concerns and challenges they're having help us identify the resource needs and then where we should allocate them to. >> Thank you. Uh two quick questions on uh commercial way zones before we I turn it back over to my colleagues. Um really quickly uh the admin fees uh had jumped to 5.9 million in uh the budgeted uh FY27. Um is this growth due to an expansion of operational zones, fee rate increases, or uh improved collection rates? So the the fee is set at it's about a little over $107,000 um per awarded Carter. All right. Um so I think we're projecting to have close to $7 million once all 20 zones are online. Um those fees are there to offset um the PS cost related to the program and the OTPS cost. Um so that's essentially just a franchise fee. Um and that was set by a user cost analysis before um the zones were implemented and and a lot of things went into account for that and as I mentioned most of it's personnel office space OTPS things like that and and that's where that that money that you're mentioning is going to >> okay and uh what is the pro uh projected trajectory for uh the CWZ fee revenue as the program reaches full citywide implementation? So, as I mentioned that that 107,000 once we get all 20 zones imple implemented, it'll be close to $7 million annually. >> Okay, cool. Uh, and now I will turn it over to uh, Council Member Purina Sanchez. >> Thank you so much, Council Member Justin Sanchez. Thank you, Chair. Uh, good morning everyone. >> Morning. Um, in December of 2025, Commissioner has as the council voted to enact sweeping street vending reform, Mayor Elect Mani publicly committed to support the critical work of implementing these reforms. The mayor guaranteed that we will process, and this is in quotes, new licenses and staff our enforcement agencies. However, the administration's fiscal 27 preliminary budget includes no new funding for the office of street vending enforcement within sanitation. And as we know, there are just 40 sanitation officers for more than 20,000 complaints per year. So my first question is with a significant number of new licenses legislated to roll out in this fiscal year, how is the Department of Sanitation complying with local law 54 of 2026 and appropriately staffing the Office of Street Vending Enforcement? >> Good morning, council member. Thank you. Um so right now our headcount is about 40 positions. um dedicated to um street vending. 35 of those are sanitation police officers. I think um we first need to assess um what the impact is as the as the initial onset of um increase in licenses go out. Um we are definitely um uh we're happy and and definitely determined to make sure that we are complying with this local law. So, I know it's 80% of the licenses that we have to inspect um on an annual basis. Um I just think, you know, right now until we see what that is like, we really won't be able to assess, but I think obviously DSNY is committed to making sure that we are maintaining that um that goal and inspecting the licenses. Um, so I just think it's just a matter of seeing how this is going to play out and then how that plays out in the actual street and make sure that we're efficient make in in in making those um, inspections. >> Thank you. Commissioner, would you say that you have enough resources to cover the licenses and illegal activity that we are seeing out there today? >> So, yeah, I think I think right now we're we have adequate resources. Um, I think right now the unforeseen challenge is going to be knowing once we get these licenses out what that's going to look like. Um, but I think obviously um, we are definitely committed to making sure I mean we don't have a choice, right? Local law is something we have to comply with, right? So we're committed to inspect to reaching that goal of at least 80%. Um, and we're working with OMB and the administration to make sure that that we are getting the adequate resources as that ramps up. >> Thank you, Commissioner. And as I sit here next to my sister from Flushing, Forom and Flushing were besties. Uh I I I'm going to just continue to push on this point. Um I do think that you need increased resources to handle what you're seeing on the ground now just uh from, you know, what we're feeling on the ground in terms of complaints um and the AY's capacity to respond. So you know, just foreshadowing that. And then my second question is that although DSNY is the lead enforcement agency for street vending, vendors often face enforcement actions from NYPD. This can be incredibly confusing for vendors. They might receive a ticket from sanitation in the morning and then another from NYPD a few hours later. Furthermore, the uniforms that DSNY officers wear look very similar today to what is worn by ICE. And you can understand, of course, why this can be alarming for street vendors in this environment. uh more than 90% of whom are immigrants. So in the interest here's the question in the interest of not having redundancies in our budget and being effective with our resources and as you scale up the office of street vending enforcement how will you coordinate with NYPD to streamline enforcement and is it possible for just DSNY to issue street vending tickets and summones? So, as far as um coordinating um I think we do we've done a great job um coordinating with NYPD um you know we still have community link where we work with them on any issues um and doing you know whether it's um operations together. Um I think as far as us being the only agency I I think that's something we have to evaluate. Um, you know, obviously there's a there's a component of like counterfeit, you know, items, things like that we that we don't enforce. So, I think um they'll probably I can't speak for NYPD, but there there might be some level of involvement on their end, but I think having them involved in this is probably, at least for now, still necessary. Um, and as far as, you know, our goal is never to confuse anybody. Um, I mean, going back to the beginning of when we took over enforcement, um, you know, from DCWP, um, we always did, you know, outreach and education and I and I still think that that's the best approach. I'm always happy to work with any of the council members on seeing if there's areas where we need to do more of that and I think we've come up with um, you know, uh, literature and things that might help that. Um and and I think once we get that piece through, then I think we can then focus on where the enforcement is necessary um in those in your districts. >> Thank you, chair. If I may, just a quick uh question on body cameras. Thank you, chair. Um did DSNY receive funding in fiscal 26 for body cameras? And if so, uh can you help us understand if this is being prioritized over additional personnel? >> Sure. So we did receive um funding for body cameras and that is for the uh entire populate universe of sanitation police officers. We have about 140 total between various units. Um and the funding for that was what do we have here? Um we received about 492,000 in FY26 and then 200,000 in FY27. Um and I'm sorry, what was the second part of your question, council member? was >> is is are the cameras being prioritized over adding? >> No, no. This was um this was again going back to transparency. I think um this was one of the things that we felt was important because as we're doing enforcement out there um we had previous instances of um issues where somebody the public said one thing and our officer said another thing and now having that the body camera can you can clearly see where the issue is and I think that's beneficial for us to be out there now and then as um street vending like as you mentioned the licenses increased to have that transparency for us to make sure that it protects the public and our workforce. >> Okay. >> Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you, chair. >> Thank you, Council Member Sanchez. Uh I want to stay on this topic of street vending quickly. Um what is the estimated additional annual cost for uh to the department for increased litter basket servicing, street cleaning, and enforcement in areas with expanded street vending under the proposed legislation? Um what percentage of this cost could be offset through vendor fees or fines? And does the department have sufficient equipment and personnel to maintain cleanliness standards in high density vending zones without impacting service levels in other areas? >> Sure. So, as far as increased litter basket servicing, um so the the vendors aren't supposed to be putting the their waste in the litter basket. So I think um going back to one of the benefits of having more licensed vendors is them being more aware of that this is these are some of the things that they you know they shouldn't be doing. So I think that's going to help us. Um you know I I think that we have as I mentioned before we we have the baseline budget now of one of the highest service levels that we've ever had. And I think just making any adjustments on overflow and litter basket complaints is where we would do it. But I don't know if it'd be specific just tied to um street vending um and them placing their waste in the litter baskets. >> Uh what is the current standard of sanitation violations issued to street vendors per a thousand vendors? Uh what percentage of vendors comply with waste disposal requirements uh like we were just talking about. uh and what additional resources do would the department need uh to improve compliance rates if the number of legal vending locations increases significantly? >> So, as far as violations issued um we really don't have that number per vendors um because sometimes um when we go out um some of the vendors are not licensed and unfortunately when we have confiscations it's because it's abandoned. Um so I'll give uh in calendar year 25 we we issued 7,296 violations. Um out of those um resulted 6,573 confiscations but out of those um 4544 were abandoned. So you know unfortunately sometimes when we approach some of these locations if they're illegal they'll just leave the the merchandise there or whatever and then then it becomes abandoned and then we confiscate it. So I think once we have the the licenses and we have a better picture, we'll probably have a better sense of the per thousand um question you had. Chair, >> thank you. Uh so the PMMR shows 2.9 uh million litter baskets were serviced in the first four months of uh FY26 down 141,000 from FY25. Uh how many additional litter baskets would need to be deployed and expanding vending zones? Um what is the projected annual cost for servicing these baskets expressed as a dollar amount if you have that? Um and percentage increase uh to the litter basket budget and what is the anticipated frequency of service daily, twice daily or more required to prevent overflow in hightra uh vending areas? >> Sure. So as far as um the additional baskets placed out for uh vending um again I think I don't our goal is to educate the vendors now and as the licenses um because one of the things I think I'd like to you know work with um our agency partners is that initial onset of education once these licenses are expanding um later this year is to educate them on proper ways of waste disposal. So, um, so I think increasing the number of litter baskets for street vendors to dispose of shouldn't be the case, but I think there may be cases where if street vendors are attracting more pedestrians, we may have to make adjustments on commercial corridors. Um, and that's something where we do all the time where we see um, you know, phone litter basket complaints or just field observations. Um, as far as number of times that we service, every litter basket gets serviced at least once a day. And then on the commercial corridors, they get serviced two times a day. >> Uh thank you. And what is the percentage of 311 complaints related to dirty conditions or overflowing trash or rodent activity uh that occurs in current highdensity vending areas compared to areas without vending? Uh has the department conducted an analysis of sanitation impact per vendor in different neighborhoods? Uh and finally, what baseline cleanliness metrics uh would the department establish to measure the success or failure of expanded vending under the new legislation? >> Sure. So, as far as stats, we don't have the stats broken down um by spec specific corridors that have vendors, but I can't say um in calendar year 2025 um as far as overflow and litter basket complaints compared to calendar year 24, we had a 2.8% 8% decrease in complaints. Um, uh, street sweeping complaints, uh, in calendar year 25, we had a 13.2 decrease in 311 complaints. And then, uh, as far as illegal dumping or, you know, removal requests, we had, we were pretty flat with a.5% increase. Um, and then abandoned vehicles, we were down 12%. So, um, they're trending in the right direction. And I think um one of the things that I'm going to try to leverage is um going back to our field data collection app is maybe including identifiers where if we have a big stretch of illegal vendors and that's something that we need to maybe analyze better that would be one of the things that we would look to incorporate into that that process. >> Thank you. Uh I'd like now to turn it over to Council Member Morano. >> Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for your leadership of uh Commissioner. Thank you for your testimony. Uh thank you as well for being so personally responsive to me during the recent snowstorm uh and for the work that sanitation workers did in extremely difficult uh conditions. I know this winter has presented a lot of real challenges. Uh that said, I do want to focus specifically on the experience in Staten Island and sort of pick up with some of the questions that council member Carr left us uh where residents felt that some of the response lagged behind what they expected. The mayor had said publicly that Staten Island's topography was one of the challenges during this storm. But as you know, being a veteran of the department, Staten Island's hills and streets layout, they're not new. Those condition conditions have existed for decades. So my question is why would the burrow's topography still pose a surprise challenge to the snow response system? >> Sure. So um council member I I don't think it was a surprise. I think um so I'll back up a little bit. Um the topography is when we have narrow streets uh hill streets like that we have equipment that we refer to as holsters. Um those are like the pickup trucks that have the inserts that dispense salt. Um and we invested this year in increasing that capacity from the two cubic yard holsters to the 4 cubic yard holsters. So that would um require operators to go back and forth to reload every time. Um I think the reality is, you know, the amount of snowfall in some of those streets um and the drifts um just made it challenging for those pieces of equipment. Um I think when we deployed I mean we deployed um 263 hired uh additional pieces of snow equipment. Um and I think when we realized that the some of some of these drifts became very very high. Um that's when we had to shift operations into we we essentially hauled out of some of these blocks. I mean, we had um blocks in like Silver Lakes where we hauled 18 loads of of of of truckloads of snow out of some of these blocks. And obviously, it's it's not that we weren't prepared. I think it's just the nature of some of these blocks. Um some of our trucks, we deployed Vplows, we deployed different kinds of equipment. And I think um it was more of those things that depending on um where we were, it just required different types of resources. And we immediately had those resources in Staten Island as soon as we realized that we had a whole lot of there and we dedicated um as I mentioned before the the the breakdown was um 339 of our own equip uh personnel and equipment, 263 hired and then we had snow shufflers which is 108. So, I think all those things put together, um, it it was just one of these unique circumstances, but as I mentioned before to council member Carr, I think it's one of those things that, um, we're not just going to say, oh, it's it was unique circumstance. We want to make sure that we make any adjustments possible for any future event in Staten Island. We did hear from multiple principles and parents that snow piles around school campuses and narrow streets prevented buses from accessing schools even after the storm had passed. Is there currently any formal protocol to prioritize plowing around schools and major school campuses after a major storm? >> Sure. Yeah. And we have um so uh we have the critical routes, facility routes that we have dedicated to those areas around schools. Um and that's one of the things that we actually do prioritize when it comes to um if we get a snow event on a on a weekend and we make sure we're ready by Monday to to have those areas clear. Um we have close coordination with DOE. Um, I mean, I was in personal touch with the deputy chancellor for facilities who was constantly updating me on on any challenges, issues they had citywide on schools. And as far as the school, the operation itself, the uh, NISM has the ELC which has representatives on site. We have daily calls with them. And then any any issues we're having with schools, those are immediately given to our operations team and we immediately, you know, we've had hundreds and hundreds of issues that we immediately addressed immediately between the January storm and the February storm. >> So, a lot of residents rely heavily on Plowen NYC, uh, which we direct constituents to, and I know the department does. We received a lot of complaints that the map showed streets as plowed when they were still clearly impassable. There were even photos and videos of people on the street saying, "This shows our street was just plowed and it wasn't." Can you explain what triggers a street being marked as plowed in the Plowen NYC system? Is it simply GPS passed by a plow or is there any verification that the street was actually cleared? And given the complaints about inaccuracies, what improvements could be made to the system to make sure that it's more reliable for the public? Sure. So, it's basically you have um thousands and thousands of of segments. So, you may have a street like Highland Boulevard um that might have hundreds of segments that are broken up. So, we use the Department of of City Planning. They have segments that they identify. We leverage that data set. It's the citywide street center line. That's the street network that we use. Um GPS data, as you mentioned, each truck has a CALM device that sends a GPS ping every 30 seconds. There's a few things and factors that may cause those kinds of issues. Um, one of them being GPS drifts. The reality is it's not perfect technology in every place. Some areas, um, you know, not Staten Island per se, um, but like the like in Manhattan, lower Manhattan, we have challenges like a canyon effect where the buildings prevent the GPS pink from being very precise. But we work through that regularly with the vendor um that that that uh has this application. And every year we look to refine this, but it's not a perfect um technology. And it's one of the things that I always try to stress is that as great as these tools are, and they really are. I mean, going back to my time, we didn't have anything. We barely had radios when I was a supervisor. Um it's always relying on supervisors verifying conditions. I think knowing that a truck traverse the street is just more awareness than anything. Um, but there could be challenges with GPS drifts where if a truck is pinging on one segment, it might drift onto another. And those are things that we look for every year and it I'd be happy to get those locations from you, council member, because it is important for us to see why that happened because that really shouldn't be the case. And if it is one of those things, then we have um logic that we work with internally to see if we can maybe we could refine those and see if there's anything else we can do to make sure that doesn't happen again or at very least know that we're looking at that segment for the next time if and we're we're looking closer to make sure that doesn't a false positive. So I'm I'm happy to get that information from you and we can evaluate that and assess that further. >> Thank you. >> Uh thank you. Uh Council Member Morano. Uh so during the snowstorm uh trash collection uh was at top of mind for uh many New Yorkers uh especially the litter basket uh servicing. So I just want to ask a few quick questions about that before I turn it over to council member Hanife. Uh what percentage of the uh department's 2 point um over $2 billion budget is allocated to litter basket servicing in fiscal year 27. And how does that compare to fiscal year 26? Okay. Uh let's see. So our litter basket service is now baselined um as I mentioned at 29.7 million for FY26 and the outy years. Um so this represents about 1.4% of DSNY's total budget. >> Uh what is the estimated per basket annual servicing cost and how does this compare to the cost of managing overflow and illegal dumping complaints? So, I think that's one of those things that it um it would be misleading if it gave you that analysis for a few things. So, um there's 23,000 approximately 23,000 baskets citywide. Um as I mentioned, you have the 29.7 million dollars that's baseline, which is about 793 truck shifts each week. That's Monday through Sunday. Um those are dedicated to litter basket areas. We have our collection trucks that pick up the household waste. Those trucks are required to service the litter baskets along their routes. So we in order for us to be more efficient, what we generally always do is that we have, let's say you live in an area that gets serviced on a Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Um those collection areas, those baskets along those collection areas should all get serviced by our refuge collection trucks. Um we always then start our litter basket service on the opposite collection, so to speak. So on an off frequency we would call it so a Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday area. Those are where we would start our litter basket services and then move into the Monday, Wednesday, Friday area. And the example that I'm giving just to make sure if there's any overflowing issues. Um so that's two things. And then the the third one is um the way our productivity program works without getting too much into detail is we have partial trucks which we internally call half trucks. Basically that means that part of the day is of the crew is allocated to work on household collections and then the rest of the day we allocate them to work on you know um manual litter patrol cleaning up litter baskets things like that. So a lot of that is meshed in together. So to give you a per litter basket number would kind of not be accurate just because of those factors that I mentioned. >> Thank you. And what percentage increase in funding would be required to provide twice a day, six day a week litter basket service citywide? >> So we believe basically it'll be close to having what we have now. So likely require a little over $30 million, which is close to the baseline funding we have now. >> And what is the current ratio of litter baskets per thousand residents across neighborhoods? Uh and what p and what percentage variance exists between the highest and lowest served areas? So we really don't uh record it by um residential by residents. It's more just on concentrated along uh commercial corridors. That's where um our basket criteria is is designed to make sure it's um not in areas that don't have a lot of high pedestrian traffic. It's more on um commercial corridors. >> And what percentage of the estimated population is served by expanded litter basket service? So we're estimating again it could be a little bit it's a rough number but it's about 75% of New Yorkers are serviced but again it's primarily focused on commercial corridors, transit hubs and in other high foot traffic areas. >> Uh finally what is the average servicing frequency per basket citywide and what percentage of baskets receive daily service versus less frequent service? So, every basket is serviced at least once a day and then the baskets on commercial corridors are serviced twice uh two times a day daily. >> Thank you. And now, uh I'm turning it over to Council Member Haneife. >> Thank you, Chair Sanchez. And hi, everyone. Great to see you. Thank you, Commissioner Lohan, for your very detailed, specific answers both here and our uh previous hearing. And I also just want to give a shout out to Frank Lera who I've been in touch with in the uh off business hours of our work trying to get parts of my district cleaned up just today. Um and also uh really happy that my district is a part of the the doggy waste dispenser pilot so far. Um, I was a pride I was the proud prime sponsor of the mandatory composting program and since its passage we really have come a long way from the days that it was deemed absolutely impossible. Um, so a few questions. San Francisco's diversion rate is almost 80% for recycling and composting combined while ours is at 19.2. What budget investments would DSNY need in order to reach similar diversion over the term? >> So, I I can't speak to San Francisco's diversion rate. I think there's calculated a little bit different, but either way, it's obviously we want to get to as close to uh that number as possible. I think um I think we're heading in the right direction. Um, you know, last year we had one of the highest um amount of of of tonnage collected in in a single week in the history of the SNY, which over 6 million pounds, which is pretty impressive. Um and I think last year one of the things we did was with existing resources is when we um shifted to make sure that um residents were aware of that this was a mandatory law. Um we have um sections that are staffed every day by supervisors. So there's about 203 sections, we call them sectors that are staffed by supervisors that are required to go out and do all kinds of things like code compliance. Um making sure the routes are completed, making sure there's any conditions that >> for this is for everything. So we we leveraged those supervisors and we conducted over almost 56,000 outreach attempts to different residents across and I think um out of those we issued almost 41,000 warnings. So, the warnings looked like a summon. They really weren't a summon, but I think um now we're going to see some of the benefits um as far as that goes. Um we resumed issuing violations to all properties. We we didn't stop issuing violations. We're still able to issue to, you know, we were uh some of the larger um properties. So, right now, we started issuing again to everything. We have about 500 violations so far for this current calendar year. >> 500 in total. >> Total. Yeah. And how much funding is going towards all things composting? >> What's the headcount on the >> So for composting, it's 33.4 million is the baseline funding for uh curbside compost. >> So it's staying the same. >> Staying the same. >> Staying the same. And then what about um what's the budget specifically for uh outreach and community engagement? Yeah. Uh, good afternoon, council member. This is substantially done with in-house resources. We have a full-time outreach staff who have knocked on 800,000 doors specifically related to curbside composting. Continue to do that work. However, we do have $2 million in grant funding for an outreach campaign specifically focused on the fact that composting is mandatory. That began today and will run over the next month, six weeks trying to hit people during um planting, leave season. >> Got it. Great. We're really grateful to organizations like Big Reuse in my district for being a a lifeline to uh every everyone um single households, full family households to understanding how to compost. Um I was also curious if there are any uh partnerships with the DOE for composting in schools but not just composting uh physically but also learning about composting. Yeah. >> Yeah. We strongly believe that students are the next generation of composters and um we run programs in schools uh directly inhouse but also through big reuse grow NYC and other um community compost partners. A lot of the curricula for these are modeled on 80s and 90s seat belt campaigns. That was our proof of concept that you know kids learned at school to put their seatelts on and they went home and told their parents to do it. Um that was the thought process. teach kids to compost, they go home and remind their parents that composting is the law. >> No, I think that's great. I think that's how it should be done as well. Um, what's the cost per smart composting bins for deployment, maintenance, and servicing? And what's the plan, future plans? >> Sorry about that. Just trying to get that. >> Yeah, no worries. Okay. Um, so you I'm sorry, council member. You wanted to know the cost on >> basically deploying them, servicing, maintenance. >> Got it. So each bin is about $5,500. That includes um the actual installation. There's a wrap that's factory installed, and then there's about a cleaning service that comes with that, which is about 12 cleanings per year per bin. Got it. And and is the idea that the city's going to continue to expand these bins? >> So, I think right now um we have about 400 composting bins across the city. One of the things that we are starting to evaluate is the the usefulness of these um bins. So, um we have the ability to see how many unlocks um uh people are using these bins for. And when we see underutilized bins, I think we're going to try to shift them. Um, but I think I'm happy to work with you or any members of the council that feel like there may be a need to re relocate them. We have been working with NICHA on putting some of those near their campuses. Um, but you know, obviously we want to make sure that we're placing them in areas that going to be most efficient. Um, you know, people are taking advantage of the weekly collections, but if we think that there's a place that would be more useful, I'm happy to work with you or any members of the council to see where would be appropriate to move. >> Got it. So you're keeping at 400 for now to just better evaluate, understand how the program is going. >> And would you say from uh any available data that >> they're useful that we should continue to expand them >> and how much how much does this program cost us? >> Yeah. So, um it's about So, we we saw that there were nearly 870,000 times where the bins were opened, and that's because we're able to tell um on the app because you need an app to unlock it. Um and then as far as continuing it, I I think it's just one of those things we're going to continue to see what the what the usage is. We saw that also approximately um 2.65 million pounds per year was also generated from somebody's bins. So I think right now it is playing a benefit. Um and again I think just strategically place them in areas where um people need to you know put out their composting more than once a week I think is where we'll look to see where we'll find more efficiencies in in these compost bins. >> Thank you. And just one final question I mean yeah question about dog poop. Um how much funds are being allocated to the dog waste dispenser pilot? >> So they're relatively really inexpensive. So, um, right now I think we're just doing it with, um, existing resources. I think I'm surprised that it's been very successful and and popular and we I think we put out in three council districts so far. >> Um, I I think one of the things that we would just want to make sure is that they're being um, managed. We don't have the we don't have the ability right now to be able to replace the bags and buy them. So, I think putting them out on our better bins has been pretty effective and popular and we'd love to work with you on expanding that in other areas. >> Excellent. Thank you. >> Uh I would like to expand that to my districts. Putting it out there. Um before we get um started with Council Member Ang, um given that we were talking about um equipment and capital budget priorities, I just want to ask a few quick questions about that. Um we have uh 1.13 billion allocated for equipment replacement over five years. What percentage of this is dedicated to replacing the aging collection truck fleet versus transitioning to mechanical trucks for containerization? >> Okay. So, as far as equipment uh funds allocated for equipment replacements, we have 1.13 billion allocated for equipment replacement uh over over every vehicle type. Um depending on the type of equipment um it's replaced depending on the life cycle. So, the most um the most uh the highest amount that we have is the reloading collection trucks, which is an 8-year life cycle along with dual bin collections is a 8-year life cycle. Um and then we have our front um front line mechanical sweepers which is a fiveyear life cycle. And then our snow equipment. You have our salt spreaders which have a 12- year life cycle. Um flow and dumps which is basically a salt spreader is a 10 year life cycle. And then our holsters which is a smaller equipment is a eight year life cycle. So those are the trucks that we um make sure that we're replenishing them and uh appropriately. And as far as the the containerization initiatives, right now um all of our new rail loading collection trucks and dual bin trucks are being outfitted with tippers. Um and then we're work we're internally working on coming up with cost estimates as far as the expansion of the entry containerization initiative. Uh so the Bronx garage replacement project uh curious if there are any cost overruns or delays affecting this project. Um, and how does this impact the department's ability to maintain adequate garage capacity citywide? >> Um, so right now we do not um anticipate any cost overruns, but that'll likely be evaluated at the conclusion of construction. Um, we're estimated to start construction at the start of 2027 with completion date of um 2034. >> Uh, what is the current 10-year uh capital plan for DSNY? And uh how is the 3.54 billion allocated between equipment uh and garages? >> So our 10-year capital commitment plan which spans um from FY2026 to FY 2035 is about 3.26 billion. Uh and out of that approximately 63% is allocated to equipment and then 33% is allocated to facilities which is about $1.1 billion. Uh how many collection trucks are scheduled for replacement annually and what is the average cost per truck? >> So um the main two uh frontline collection vehicle u vehicles, heavy duty vehicles are our reloading collection trucks and our dual bin collection trucks. So for FY um 27, we anticipate replacing 104 of the rear loading collection trucks, which have a price tag of about $545,000. And then our dual bin collection trucks for FY27, we anticipate replacing 80 of those. And the price tag on those about $573,000. >> Uh beyond the Bronx garage, are there any uh capital projects experiencing any significant delays or cost overruns? And if so, uh what steps are being taken to bring them back on track? >> Uh as of currently, we we are not anticipating any significant delays and and no cost overruns in any of the projects you mentioned. >> Great. And then uh what percentage of the capital budget is allocated to sustainability initiatives such as electric or hybrid vehicle purchases or charging infrastructure. Let's see here. Um I have to get back to you on that chair. >> Uh thank you. uh how does uh the department prioritize capital investments across competing needs like fleet replacement, garage upgrades, containerization infrastructure, transportations. >> Sure. So I I obviously um you know vehicle uh replacement is one of the things that we always want to make sure that we're not falling behind on because then there is a cascading effect. Uh unfortunately we saw some of that during COVID where we you know didn't purchase any um vehicles uh heavy duty vehicles and then that created a ripple effect with um you know we had to shift some of the operations to subsequent shifts and you know then there's you know extra overtime added to repair some of these agent vehicles. So that's the priority and then as far as capital investments for our facilities that's one of the things that we you know we always want to make sure that we're investing in our facilities. Um but I think there's a delicate balance as I mentioned 66% of that goes to fleet and then the remaining goes to our our facilities. Oh, and and then just going back, I have the number. Um, so we have for as far as um electric u vehicles, as far as your sustainability initiatives, we have um 25 um small alley collection trucks. And then we are um replacing uh it's about 360 million um for bike lane equipment which is um a battery electric vehicle which is a the small sweepers that we have. >> Thank you. Uh what is the expected useful life of new collection trucks being procured and how does this compared to the current fleet age? So um the rearloading collection reloading and dual bin collection trucks use for life is about eight years. Um and right now the average is about five years for um rear loading collection trucks and about 5 and a half years for dual pin trucks. >> Uh are there opportunities to extend the useful life of existing equipment through enhanced maintenance programs uh thereby reducing capital uh replacement costs? >> Sure. And that's one of the things that we always look for. um we work with Dcast on that and we're always exploring strategies on new best practices um you know maintenance approaches things like that but yeah that's one of the things that we always look forward to expand that >> uh curious how much has been uh allocated for u marine transfer station upgrades and maintenance in the current capital plan. >> So there's about $38 million is allocated to the 10-year capital commitment plan for marine transfer station upgrades and maintenance. Uh and could you elaborate a little bit on the role the capital budget plays in supporting the transition to mechanical collection for containerization? >> Sure. So that's one of the things that we are evaluating. Um we are we put out an RFP for the side loading collection truck um and that was thankfully approved. Now we are working to see um what the expansion of a potential citywide roll out would be. Um, and I think that's one of those things that once we nail down a number, we'll be able to then have a better sense of what that commitment would be on the capital plan. >> Thank you. And I am so sorry, but I completely overlooked Council Member Brewer. Um, and I want to make sure. >> Yes, >> thank you very much. And thank you for your testimony. Um, which is very detailed and like everybody else, Frank Letterer is a rock star, but so is Glenn Baldwin who is the uh district manager in seven. >> Good to hear. >> So, um, alternate side of the street parking. I don't know if it's a citywide issue, but in Manhattan, it's a big problem because we don't have the cameras yet in Albany. That would be helpful. But in the interim, I'm trying to we literally go leaflet work with the precinct, then the sweeper comes down the street in some blocks. It's a very laborintensive project. So my question is, I would think you're kind of losing money on the fact that the sweeper sometimes just goes down the middle of the block because nobody moves. So, I'm just wondering other I who knows what happens in Albany. I have no idea if that passes, but do we have any other is there a budget cost to this and is there any other solution to getting these darn cars to move? They don't even move when they're sitting in the car. >> I loved your sticker idea last time. >> Yes, I'm ready for the stickers. Try to get the city council to do it. Yes. >> So, I I think it's one of those things that um we're just going to have to do with existing resources. So this week, well actually last week, um we we focused some of our enforcement efforts on some of those street cleaning regulation areas and we were averaging about 5,000 parking violations per day, which is very effective. >> You know, it's one of those things where I'm pulling the supervisors into different directions where because organics enforcement and things like that, but I think it's one of those things we're just going to have to shift back and forth. But I I honestly think the sticker is one of the best. >> Thank you. because I want my colleagues to support me on that. Second, graffiti. Um, you do a great job. How much does it cost and how often is it done and how do you decide when and where to do graffiti removal? >> Graffiti removal. >> We really appreciate it. I know you do buildings, others do other aspects, but you do buildings. >> So, the budget is $2.7 million for fiscal year 26. >> Fiscal year 26. Yeah. Okay. And we that's managed that's a you know we use the doe fund so we're just managing that operation. Um and and and we use 311 complaints um that's how we you know when we track and remove the graffiti complaints that we get. >> So it's based on it's basically on on 311 complaints. >> Correct. 311 complaints. Sometimes we get you know um inquiries from elected officials, your offices, community boards and then we'll you know obviously deploy those resources where necessary. >> Okay. the batteries issue. I mean, I was around when the first fire started. That was al obviously FDNY, but you also I don't know if it's increased or decreased and what the cost is of it's very frightening when you have a fire in a truck. So, I'm wondering uh just to give us a sense of the cost that has been incurred as a result of these batteries and how you're addressing it. So unfortunately um we have seen a spike in vehicle fires some and as far as our trucks are concerned the only issue is um FDNY can't always determine that the cause the root cause was from a a battery fire. I mean that's likely the case. Um but we are seeing increase in that. Um sometimes we're fortunate enough where you know we have I mean it's not a sightly um thing to do. we have to offload the material into the street because we don't want to lose the truck. In those cases, we have very little um expense there. But sometimes if we lose the whole truck, that's basically just replacing the whole truck, which is, you know, over $500,000 per vehicle. But, you know, depends on, you know, how how quick we're able to respond. >> How many have you had, do you know, in the last year approximately when you say there was a spike? >> Yep. Yep. We had um on in calendar year 2024 we had 152 fires and then 2025 we had 168 uh truck fires. >> Oo, that's a lot. >> And currently to date um 38 truck fires. So >> yeah. >> Okay. Um the budget for I know you said in your testimony that we all need to be good dog owners. I do not have a dog, but I do have to clean up from dogs. So my question is, what is the budget either yours or elsewhere in the city for telling these outrageous owners to clean up? It's the law. I I remember when it passed. >> Yeah. Thank you, council member. We have done a number of outreach campaigns around it with existing resources. We don't have a dedicated budget line for this. We've also partnered with members of the council on it. We did it with uh then council members Menon and Botcher. Always looking for new partners to work with on this. >> So it's mostly whatever can be done. There's no budget. >> Yeah. For, you know, unfortunately, it's an issue where people know the law. I mean, outreach is great. You know, I'm Mr. Outreach, right? But it's not that people don't know they're supposed to clean up after their dog. Obviously, everyone knows it's their responsibility. You know, the issue is that we've got to continue to come up with new strategies for this. This new dispenser pilot is one option, but >> the litter basket and the dispenser on the litter basket. Okay. Well, that will cost something, too, though. >> Yeah. They're like 20 bucks each. 20 bucks to each basket. Okay. Is that something that you're doing or you're thinking of doing? >> So, we we're doing it now. Um I mean, it's a pilot, so we're doing it with um existing OTPS funds. >> Um just the one thing um if if we want to expand it, we just don't have the resources to change out the the actual bags. And somebody has to do that. >> Somebody's got to do that. So, yeah, I think some of the council members have partnered with I think ACE or some of the other um groups out there. >> Okay. I know we talked about abandoned vehicles. I just want to understand more, not that so much that cost, but it is confusing to the public what you do versus PD. And I must admit, I thought it was mostly you, but I I know when you have the license plates, that's PD. When I sometimes I just take them off. I'll be honest with you, so that I can get rid of the car. I know how to unscrew them. >> I do. I see it online. I don't care because I want to get rid of the car. But the question is um what like how many do you did last year did you remove or does it does the public understand the difference? Does 311 understand the difference? How does it work just in terms of logistics? >> Sure. So 311 >> there are a lot of complaints about abandoned cars. A lot. >> Yep. I I don't think most public the public doesn't understand. I think they just see a car sitting there and they're just saying it's abandoned, derelictked. Um but that's what our responsibility falls into. The supervisor will go out the license plate is the number one thing that's like we can't touch. So then then we refer to NYPD. Um but I think we've done a really good job. Um last year in um in in FY26 we we to date and currently year to date we're about 4571 vehicles removed. Um so that's on you know that's on course with um the previous fiscal year. Um, we've had a lot of good coordination with NYPD. So, you have the vehicle recovery team. Um, and then we have just regular tag and tow operations that we go out because it it shouldn't be the public's responsibility to figure out if it's roto or derelik. So, we just go out with PD. We set up a tag and tow date and we'll go out and then anything that's derelict or roto either they take if it's roto or we'll take it if it's uh derelik. So, I think it's been pretty effective and we're going to continue to to to do that. >> Okay. Just one final question. So there aren't a lot of tow locations, nothing in Manhattan, but the tow companies, you said you had four contracts. They take it to their own place. They don't take it to a PD or one of your correct >> tow places. >> Correct. They have their own yards um and they they're supposed to store it and then you know we send out now we have to send out a letter um if there's a VIN number and if there's a uh we able to locate the property owner or lean holder and we'll send out a letter. >> Do you have any sense if some of them uh you don't have plates on them? But if they do have plates, you have some sense it's ghost plates. So, you just don't know. We don't keep track of that. >> NYPD does keep track of that if they're ghost cars. Um, and that's one of the things that the vehicle recovery team does. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh, council member, really quick before we continue, I want to make sure that we're touching quickly on waste export costs. Um what is uh the uh department's current annual expenditure on wa waste export and how does the budgeted uh nearly 600 million compared to actual spending and how has this figure evolved in the past five fiscal years? >> All right. So uh the $594.8 million we do you know generally we think that does reflect what we expect to spend this year. um you know adjustments are made each year in our budget to reflect actual um tonnage on the street. I think the the hard thing here is you have two two main components that contribute to the cost. You have what the actual tonnage is that we collected which is uncontrollable and then we do have long long-term waste export contracts and we the pricing is very predictable. Each year we get an increase based on the consumer price index. So we have that all contracted out and under control. uh are there any additional factors that contribute to uh the increase in waste export costs beyond inflation and and the adjustments that >> it's just it's the adjustments and then it's what tonnage we collected. >> Uh how do the terms of this uh department's long-term waste export contracts impact current and future budget projections? >> Yeah, I mean, you know, we don't always know what the what the CPI is going to be going into future years, but it's generally predictable and it's within a range. So that's really how we uh project into the into the future at least in terms of contractual rates. >> Uh are there opportunities to renegotiate existing uh waste export contracts to achieve more favorable terms? >> So we put together these long-term contracts with the idea of not having fluctuations and volatility in the market. Um so our main contractors we have set for the for the long term. So we really don't have any opportunities to renegotiate any sort of uh major terms in those contracts in the near future. >> Uh what if any operational efficiencies uh have you implemented or planned uh to implement to help reduce the per ton cost of waste export? >> So one of the things that we have worked with the vendors um is to make sure we have uh the staffing of the transfer stations right sized and appropriate. You know, when these transfer stations were first put into place, there was an idea of what would be appropriate. And then obviously over time since we've had the transfer stations open for some time now, we've been able to make uh staffing adjustments within that. And that's been able to uh control our cost per ton. >> Uh while there has been a small reduction, it's been an increase nonetheless from 17% to 19.4% in terms of our recycling diversion rate. Um, how have any uh waste reduction initiatives uh such as citywide curb composting affected the volume of waste requiring export and associated costs? >> I mean, I think as a general matter, um, the cost per ton on organic waste and on exporting refues are roughly the same. So, it's really just a transferring it from one place to another. Uh and finally, what alternative waste management strategies is the department uh exploring to mitigate rising export costs and what are uh some potential projected savings? >> I I can take that chair. So I think one of the things that um we think would be very effective is EPR. I think EPR and I know there's um that state legislation that it's it's in discussion now. I think that's where we would see the biggest shift as far as kind of any kind of savings for export cost and obviously diversion rates and things like that. So EPR is one of the things that we support and I think would be uh beneficial to to that. >> Thank you so much. Uh and now I'd like to finally turn it over to council member Ugg. Thank you so much for your patience. >> Thank you chair commissioner. You said to my colleague, Council Member Sanchez, that you believe the agency can meet current vending enforcements with 40 officers. I do find that concerning because I could guarantee you um this is not being met in my district. So, can you clarify what you mean to that? I mean, do you are you referring to only expecting licensed vendors or to the enforcement of vendor regulations or more broadly, it includes illegal vending and vending vending zones? Yeah, I I think there's areas that we uh inspect regularly. Um I mean I think if there's is there's I believe there's areas along your corridor that we inspect regularly um along Main Street. So I'd have to kind of see give you specific stats on that, but um I believe that's one of the areas that we inspect regularly. So there's a bunch of corridors that we're we're aware of and that's those are one of the things that we inspect. >> No, I appreciate the collaboration with the inspection of my corridor and you do. However, I'm here saying it is not enough. I'm just testifying like I'm just telling you I still get complaints all the time about not having enough forcement in my no vending zone. So, I just want to be clear that you know it is not enough in my district. Also, to follow up on council member Sanchez's question about the roll out of new vendors and there will be an assessment about what are the needs. Can you be a little specific about how do you plan to do that assessment? Is it by you gonna visit all the districts? Is it by the elected officials, council members? Is it by the 311 calls? Because this is very concerning to me and already I'm tell I'm saying my district is already overwhelmed by vendors. >> Sure. So, and I'll back up a little bit about the previous issue. So, um, December, January, and February, um, was very a very busy snow season. And I'm I'm sure you're, you know, the challenges you're seeing in your district were beyond those months. But, um, unfortunately, when we have snow operations, those uh, police officers that have had, we have to shift to snow operations because it's all hands- on deck. Um, so I'm not sure if that those were the time frames where you were seeing some some um, challenges. Um but as far as you know once we increase the license licenses I think it's a combination of all those I think um I think our evaluation and assessment on the ground is going to be one of the main components um and we anticipate having tracking internal tracking systems to see um where the vendors are and where we should be going to but I think um it's really unclear on how many licenses um we're going to see at a given time so I think once we once once that period starts we'll have a better idea. No, thank you as always. I look forward to working on this issue. Okay, >> thank you. >> Thank you so much. Uh, and now turning it over to one of our favorite topics in the department, containerization. Uh, before we continue, uh, so DSNY expanded containerization requirements to all New York City businesses in fiscal year 24 and all buildings uh, with 1 to9 residential units in fiscal year 25 uh, with 70% of the city's trash now required in bins. The PMMR shows containerization enforcement surged 146% in the first four months of fiscal year 26. The uh Manhattan 9 containerization pilot represents a significant a significant operational shift. Still haven't had that coffee. Assessing its success is critical before citywide expansion. Uh what is the current compliance rate for residential properties in M9 using the required containers uh expressed as a percentage of total properties? Sure. So, um, right now we we've observed very broad compliance in M9, it's been very successful, but since the start of the summons period, so when we started the pilot, which was June 1st, we gave a 30-day warning period. So, on June 30th, um, we started the summon period. We're seeing as far as the 1 to9 unit buildings, um, about 72% of one to nine unit buildings, um, we're saying are broadly in compliance. I mean, meaning they haven't received a summon. Um, and then almost 70% of all buildings in M9 haven't received a warning or a summon. So, that's obviously very successful and very broad as far as compliance goes. >> Uh, what is the total cost of the pilot as a percentage of the annual operating budget and what is the per household cost of implementing containerization um in the pilot? So uh the total cost for PS and OTPS um budget for the M9 containerization pilot uh it's for schools and residential it's about 2.1 million um and this is approximately u 0.1% of our total operating budget. Um as far as we don't have that um that percentage as far as the per household percentage but we can work on trying to get you that cost estimate. >> Thank you. appreciate that. Um, and uh, given these numbers, what is the projected cost to expand containerization citywide and what percentage increase would this represent uh, to uh, the department's capital budget? >> So, we're fully committed to reaching citywide containerization. Um, whether it's the wheelie bin or the empire bin, um, we're still working on determining what those costs are. I think one of the things in um local law 180 of 2025 that's in there is that um we've made it pretty flexible in the sense of you have the 10 to 30 unit buildings that are have will have the ability to opt in and I think that that'll be a determining factor that we're working on estimates right now we get a a full view a full sense of what that may look like as far as cost for um capital commitment. Uh and speaking about costs, um what is the estimated cost to upgrade uh the department's entire fleet to the mechanical trucks that would be needed and what percentage of the fleet replacement budget uh over the next 5 years is currently allocated to this? So, as far as um the side loader collection trucks for the Empire bin pilot, um which as I mentioned, we're still working to um those projections. But as far as the tipper trucks, currently we have about 10% of our rail loading and dual bin fleet outfitted. So it's about 274 trucks that have the tippers on the back of those trucks. And um now as we go into every new purchase for rail loaders and dual bins, those tippers are already um installed on the factory. So we don't have to retrofit them. >> Um and by what percentage has collection time per route changed with mechanical collection? So that that's really something that we're not able to gauge right now because it's it's just at the pilot, but one of those things that obviously we'll look at once we scale up to citywide and other districts. >> Uh what percentage of uh sanitation workers in Manhattan 9 uh their injuries are related to manual lifting versus mechanical collection? So um in M9 you still have about um you have about 55% of the refuge tonnage is serviced by side loaders and then the rest are the traditional rear loaders. Um and not only those but those sanitation workers are still required to you know service litter baskets. Um they do have manual litter patrol those kinds of functions. So they're still susceptible to the traditional injuries. Um I don't have numbers specific for M9, but citywide about over 40% of sanitation worker line of duty injuries are sprains and strains um which is obviously the manual collection of um of bags. >> Um what percentage reduction in overtime has M9 experienced due to increased collection efficiency with these mechanical trucks? So right now there is no um there is there is no um uh there is no increase or a decrease as far as funding goes for M9. Um so the budget right now is just for the pilot the 2.1 million for for the pilot. >> Uh and what is the enforcement rate in M9 expressed as violations issued per a thousand households? Um if you have that and how does uh this compare to the containerization enforcement rate citywide? Sure. Uh, so citywide, the first four months of FY26, there were about 43 containerization violations were issued per 10,00 residential buildings. And then in M9, uh, 170 containerization violations were issued per 10,000 residential buildings over the same time period, but um, the number of citywide households um is much larger than the number of households in NM9, just for comparison. Uh and what funding sources are currently used for the pilot implementation? Uh what percentage comes from city uh capital budget versus federal or state grants? >> So right now it's all city tax levy funds. Um we're not getting any funded provided by any outside parties. No, there is no state or federal funding in the in the containerization pilot. >> Uh thank you so much. I uh realize that uh Dem conference will be starting soon. So, I do want to turn it over to uh Council Member Hankerson in the right after. >> I'll be as brief as possible. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um really quickly, and if you can just uh best to your ability to keep the answers concise, I'm going to try and speed through these questions. Um what is the AY's budget for enforcement officers? >> Sure. Um just grab that. If you want to go to the next question while he looks at >> the followup to that would be how many enforcement officers are assigned to that unit >> to the unit of >> enforcement unit. >> Okay. So right now our enforcement headcount is um 94 sanitation enforcement um they're non-uniform personnel. So you have enforcement agents and then you have um u asas which is associate sanitation enforcement agents. So that's 94. Um and then we have 118 sanitation police officers. Um 37 sanitation lieutenants, four inspectors. So for a total of 159 total positions related to enforcement all across different areas. Um and that's uh illegal vending um that's traditional um impounds like for illegal dumping cameras, things like that. So it's spread across different areas. >> Okay. So, for those that are assigned to address uh illegal vending, how many of those are um assigned to Queens andor uh and are they broken up into garages or community board district? So, we don't have um specific assignments because it's 35. So, we have to spread them out across the different burrows. So, we run about five to six different teams every day. We try to keep one in in Queens every day. Um, so I I would say you have one team every day, but if we have areas where we need to focus on, we'll we'll shift resources around. >> Is there data that shows the areas that they've been assigned to? >> Not publicly. No, >> not publicly. Um, would we would we be able to follow up? Yeah, I would love to work with you and and work on what the data that you're looking for and working >> because more specifically uh in my district, business owners have consistently been told that enforcement action couldn't be taken uh on a vendor that is known to sell non-FDA and USDA approved seafood from a van. Um because the SNY has to catch the individual in the act. Uh and often times an officer uh is either unavailable or when an officer is available uh for some reason that that particular street that the vendor operates off of every Saturday from 11 to 3 p.m. Um they just somehow skip that street. Uh so my hope uh would be that we can work together on that. >> Absolutely. I'd love to get that those particulars and and try to set up a focused operation there. >> Thank you. And there's two quick uh questions regarding the storm. Um, how much did the department spend on PDM workers during the recent storm? >> I think it was about 34 million. Was 34 million? >> I want to say it was about 34 million, but I'll get for get those for you soon. You're talking about you're referring to the emergency snow shovelers, correct? >> Yes. >> Yeah, I think it was 34 million. And I I guess out of that that number, how many individuals were actually hired? >> I think at our so we were averaging about 1,800 per day and then I think at our peak we were about um 3,400 um but depending on the day but that was pretty much the average the 1,800 uh daily average and then we peaked at 3,400 snow shovelers. >> Did did they work alongside other uh city employees from other departments like parks? >> Um no. So DOT has their own they they received their own cohort of snow shovelers. So they work together with DOT personnel. Um the our snow emergency snow shovelers only worked with our personnel. So we had sanitation workers, enforcement agents um and other enforcement personnel. Yeah. I'm sorry. It was not 34 million. It's 3.4 million. Sorry. >> Okay. I was like that's a lot of money. >> Forgot the forgot the decimal. >> 3.4 million uh for the recent snowstorm. >> Correct. >> Okay. And that's 1,800 folks hired per day >> on average per day and then at the peak it was about, you know, over 3,000. Correct. >> Um, and you said there was no collaboration with other agencies that >> uh No, I mean we had collaboration from other agencies that helped us on pedestrian infrastructure and I mean that was greatly helpful. I mean the going back to the first storm um there there were about 200 um personnel employees from DOT D parks that helped us on that regard and then they continued that for the second storm. Um but I don't know if there was direct um coordination with the other agencies. They just worked alongside us but not necessarily with those snow shovelers. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Okay. You're welcome. >> Uh thank you so much. Uh and now uh Council Member Vernikov. >> Thank you, Chair. Uh thank you, Commissioner, for being here today to testify and also of course as always, thank you for all the work the sanitation department does. Uh specifically for being so responsive with our needs in our district. Um, okay. My first question is in your opening testimony, you cited snow removal as one of the core three core functions of the agency, which has had obviously two very large snow snowstorms. Uh, the first was followed by a temperature freeze that complicated snow removal. Does the five-year funding formula that's in the city charter make it more difficult for the city to be prepared for these generational snowstorms? No, I I think um we have we OM um has been very very um responsive and and receptive when we need additional funds for whether it's salt need or anything else as far as the snow budget goes. So I think the way it's currently structured, we have not uh experienced any challenges and I I don't anticipate that there should be a need to that structure. >> Got it. Thank you. For the last five fiscal years, there's been a gap of a couple of hundred from budgeted uniform headcount versus actual uniform headcount. Is there an explanation for that? >> Yeah. Uh >> Sure. Um we've been overbudgeted headcount for uniform for this past several years. Uh the way our hiring works is at the beginning of the year we hire to a peak and then tr a trit down to the budgeted level over the course of the fiscal year. So if you look at the average on any fiscal year our headcount will be above the budgeted headcount. >> Understood. Thank you. And one last question. For over a decade there have been plans to join Brooklyn 15 and 13 sanitation districts and garages in securing a location to house both in a facility closer to Coney Islands. the agency in the past has supported this but uh seemingly cannot accommodate it within the budget. Do you have any updates on these plans of what it would take to realize them? >> I think one of the biggest challenges we have with either the replacement of garages or even doing major renovations in current garages is finding additional space. As you see, the city is pretty densely populated. Um, and doing space surges, especially for something like a a sanitation garage to find that amount of space to house a building plus parking has be been extremely difficult for us and we've really struggled with that. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, council member. Um, turning to uh our last two topics of the day. One, uh, sidewalk cafes. uh how many sidewalk cafes and outdoor dining establishments are currently operating under the permanent outdoor dining program and what is the department's role in enforcing cleanliness standards around these establishments? Uh what percentage of the department's enforcement capacity is currently dedicated to sidewalk cafe sanitation compliance? >> So we defer a do on the amount of sheds out there. Um we're only thing we're really enforcing is cleanliness along or you know any commercial corridor or any particular segment for um a failure to clean 18 in into the curb um which we know we issue regularly depending on the observations not necessarily specific to the sidewalk cafes. We really don't have any dedicated resources for that. What is the estimated annual cost for increased litter basket servicing, grease and food waste management, and rodent mitigation in areas with high concentration of sidewalk cafes? Uh what percentage have sanitation complaints increased in outdoor dining zones compared to prepandemic levels? And has sanitation uh requested additional funding to address the impacts of permanent outdoor dining infrastructure? >> So, we don't have um specific resources for that. We again we don't really um we just respond to any general 301 complaints related to cleanliness issues. Um DOT may get those specific ones to sidework cafes. Um but you know again you know we love to look at those enforcement numbers once now now I know there is um the legislation to make that year round and I think once we understand what you know the restrictions or any kind of guidelines along that we'd be able to better gauge that and work with DOT and our other agency partners on establishing you know what that would look like and then obviously sharing information so we can better you know enforce those areas. >> Great. Uh, and do you have a current violation rate for sidewalk cafes? >> No. So, the only violation rate we have, as I mentioned, is just specific just generally. So, um, failure to clean into 18 in into the street, um, for last calendar year, we issued over 5,000, um, S26 violations, which would be, you know, in line with, you know, keeping the area clean there, but not necessarily specific to sidewalk cafes. Uh, and what percentage of these outdoor dining structures are located in areas where the department already provides enhanced cleaning services versus neighborhoods that receive standard service levels? Uh, and how does the department determine whether additional street cleaning passes or litter basket placements are warranted in areas with dense concentration of sidewalk cafes? >> So, I think now that the program is likely to be year round, we'll be able to better assess. I think now that they were taken down for the winter, um it's hard to really tell what that is, but I think once they're permanently, we'll be able to have that sense of what resources or, you know, diver diverted resources we would need to make sure that that the areas are kept clean. >> Uh what is the estimated cost per sidewalk cafe for the department to provide adequate sanitation services in the immediate vicinity? Um aka like 50 feet within the within 50 ft of the structure. Uh should these costs be borne by the general sanitation budget or recovered through fees assessed to outdoor dining permit holders? Uh and what percentage of sidewalk cafe operators currently pay any fees that contribute to uh the department sanitation efforts? >> So I'm not aware of any fees that um come to our budget. um defer that to do but um again until we really get a sense of where these structures will permanently be we really can't give a sense of what that would be of the resource need for cleanliness. >> Thank you. And last but not least uh what we are all waiting for uh the World Cup uh and um USA 250. So, uh, what is the projected cost for the department sanitation operations during USA 250 celebrations and FIFA World Cup 2026 events in New York City? Uh, so we're talking about additional personnel, collection trucks, litter baskets, um, and portable sanitation facilities that will be required. Um, what percentage increase in the operating budget do these major events represent compared to typical summer operations? So, I think right now we're just in active conversations with uh CECM and the event organizers. Um I don't think we really have a sense of what the resource need would be, but I could assure you that we're in active conversations with OMB to make sure that we are appropriately funding this. Um a comparison would be back in 2014, we had Super Bowl Boulevard and we had more than adequate resources for that event. So, I'm sure that that's something once we know the dates, times, locations, we'll have enough resources to make sure the area is maintained. And we don't manage the outdoor portable um restrooms as far as I would defer those to CCM to see which agency manages that. That wouldn't be DSNY. Um given that we're going to have so many people just on that question of portable restrooms um do you does the department see any need to invest in uh bringing additional portable restrooms or uh expanding any kind of program uh like that? Uh >> sure. So um we don't currently use um we don't have a portable restroom um program as far as the SNY is concerned. So, I would just defer those to CCM, the mayor's office, and see which agency is is tasked with that because right now we really don't have that uh in our uh portfolio. >> Great. Um has uh the department secured dedicated funding for sanitation operations for 250 or World Cup. Um and will these costs uh or will the cost be absorbed by the current existing uh budget? And what is the anticipated tonnage of waste generated during these events compared to normal daily collection volumes uh expressed as a percentage? Um and are there any contingency plans in place if event related costs exceed the budget allocations? >> So we we don't have any dedicated funding as it as we speak right now, but um I think we've we've had initial conversations with OB on that and I think we'll um make sure that we'll have enough resources. Um, as far as contingency plans, we'll always have um plans for cleanups. And again, it really depends on the amount of um throughput we're getting in some of these areas. But I think um you know, based on any other events that we have, you know, that we normally do cleanups for, I think we'll have adequate resources for anything that comes our way. Uh what percentage of the summer event sanitation costs uh will be reimbursed by event organizers, federal agencies or other funding sources versus absorbed by t city taxpayers? Uh also does the department plan to balance event sanitation needs u or how does excuse me the uh department plan to balance the sanitation needs uh with maintaining regular service levels and neighborhoods not hosting events? >> Sure. So, we're not aware of uh reimbursements planned at this time. Um but, you know, I will work with OMB to see if there's anything identified. And as far as um making sure that we don't have any other um operations or resources impacted, we anticipate running some of these the cleanups cost uh operations on overtime. So, um I think we'll have more than adequate resources available. We just um working with OM on on the resources and the overtime incurred on these these events. Uh it's like you read my next question. Uh what is the estimated overtime expenditure um for these events expressed as a dollar amount uh and a percentage of the total event sanitation budget? How many uh uniformed and civilian personnel will be dedicated to such event operations? And what impact uh if any will this have on regular collection schedules, streets cleaning schedules in non-event areas during the same time? So, since we don't have a a definite uh location of some of these events, we don't have a projection. But, um I will say that we don't anticipate um any challenges with any uh cleaning operations, collection operations. Um and thankfully, this is a summer, so we don't have to worry about snow. Um but I would say that um the only impacts we may see is sometimes some of these events um close down streets during the day, so we may have to shift some of our collection operations to an early shift, like a midnight to 8. But uh we don't anticipate any other issues impacts of regular services. >> And last but not least, based on sanitation operations during previous major events. So we're talking New York New York's Eve. Wow. Uh New Year's Eve marathons, parades. Um what is the average cost per attendee for waste management and street cleaning? Um how does uh the department project this will scale uh for USA 250 and World Cup events uh with significantly larger crowds? Um, and are there any lessons that we've learned from past events that are being incorporated into planning to improve efficiency and reduce costs expressed as a percentage savings? >> Sure. So, um, we don't we the only thing that we as far as lessons learned is um, you know, once you get into these large event um, you know, type scale operations um, having all our equipment in into some of these areas is not really efficient. So, we would probably use more of a manual sweeping operation and ham room, things like that. But, as far as anything else, we would just, you know, clean up as we normally would any other special event. >> Uh, I want to thank you for taking all the time to answer all of our questions. I have a ton more. Um, and we will definitely be sending those over u because I know everyone has many things to do. I thank you for over three hours of testimony today. Um, and I really appreciate all the work uh that the men and women of the department do. So, thank you. Um, and thank you again, Frank, and congratulations on the 2026 Sloan Award. Um, it is much much welld deserved. Um, >> I think we are good, >> right? Thank you, chair. Thank you, everyone. >> Thank you, Commissioner. It's worth it. Thank you. I am now opening the hearing for public testimony. I want to remind members of the public that this is a government proceeding and that decorum highlight underline bold italicized decorum shall be observed at all times. As such, members of the republic of the public shall remain silent at all times. The witness table is reserved for people who wish to testify. No video recording or photography is allowed from the witness table. Further, members of the public may not present audio or video recordings as testimony, but may submit transcripts of such recordings to the Sergeant-at-Arms for inclusion in the hearing record in record. If you wish to speak at today's hearing, please, if you have not already and you are in person, fill out an appearance card with the Sergeant-at-Arms and wait to be recognized. When recognized, you will have two minutes to speak on the Department of Sanitation's budget. If you have a written statement or additional written testimony you wish to submit for the record, please provide a copy of that testimony to the Sergeant-at-Arms. You may also email written testimony to testimony@counsel.nyc.gov. Again, that email is testimony@counsel.nyc.gov within 72 hours of this hearing. Audio and video recordings will not be accepted. Okay. Uh first we are starting with the first panel will be uh Rhonda Kaiser, Rebecca Seb, Leon Fineold, and Ellen Cooper. We will wait till everyone is seated and then get started. Uh we'll start from stage left to right I hope and you can begin. >> Thank you. Uh, good afternoon, Chair Sanchez and the sanitation committee. Thank you for this opportunity to speak. My name is Rebecca Subnam, and the first time I ever testified at city hall was in sixth grade. Cafeteria culture has taught us about the detrimental effects of styrofoam trays we used in school then. I was intensely shy as a kid, but they taught me to believe that it was my right to be heard. I joined my first rally to translate my education into action. The rally gave me enough courage to walk my 11-year-old self all the way down to city hall from the lower east side and testify using what I learned in school. Now I'm here testifying again over a decade later after attending Columbia University with a major in sustainable development and a minor in public health. When I entered my freshman year at Colombia, the foundational environmental education I already had through cafeteria culture provided an understanding of how interconnected the climate crisis is to every aspect of our lives. This allowed me to keep up with students who are much more privileged in resources than me. As I've continued my environmental studies path, this Pablo Frier quote has kept me grounded. When education is not liberating, the dream of the oppressed is to become the oppressor. Comprehensive environmental education teaches students in underserved communities that through advocacy work, we can improve both our own lives and the lives of others. Our successes are not mutually exclusive and we don't have to adhere to systems that oppress us. The advocacy skills I learned in between the lines of CFCU lesson plans built confidence in me and my fellow peers who are often overlooked, showing us that another world is possible for us to co-create. I am here in front of you now as a cafeteria culture teacher in an afterchool class at the Lower East Side Girls Club. I have the honor of mentoring students just like me. By reinvesting in my community, I can help these young students come up with innovative solutions to issues that burden our shared community and dream bigger than our circumstances. I wouldn't have the opportunities I did, gotten into the college I did, or become the person I am proud of today if it wasn't for the transformative environmental education I received in public schools through cafeteria culture. All powered through New York City Council discretionary funding. Thank you for your time. >> Thank you for your testimony. And I see you, Paulo Frier. Hi, good afternoon, Chair Sanchez, and um thank you for this opportunity to speak. Also, I'm Rhonda Kaiser. I'm the policy and program director for cafeteria culture. We are an environmental education organization and our students become climate leaders and bring about systemic change by taking hyperlocal action in their own school cafeterias. We catalyze the elimination of styrofoam from school cafeterias in New York City and across the country. Our students started monthly plastic free lunch days in New York City public schools and twice a year nationwide. And now these monthly events have led to measurably significant reduction in single-use plastics in school lunches on a regular lunch service days from 2022 until now. Cafeteria Culture is deeply grateful to you, the New York City Council, for your investment in FY25 and FY26 that has funded us to teach our compost education curriculum and to develop our pilot and latest systemic waste reduction initiative, Mindful Choice Meals, a program that has reduced cafeteria food waste by 50% in the schools that we piloted in and increased student consumption by 15 to 46%. in our pilot schools just by allowing students to choose what they want to eat within the USDA guidelines. Our trusted partners, New York City Public Schools Office of Food and Nutrition Services are collaborating with us this spring to scale Mindful Choice meals this year to 32 schools, one per district. New York City Public Schools spends between 200 and $250 million annually on school meals, making it the second largest institutional food provider in the United States after the US military. Um, reducing cafeteria food waste represents a major opportunity for significant fiscal savings and climate impact. This is a moment for New York City Council to invest in scaling solutions that work. With greater investment from New York City Council, we can move from district pilots to citywide implementation, dramatically reducing cafeteria food waste and our climate footprint while saving millions in food costs and giving students a meaningful voice in how their cafeterias operate. >> Thank you so much for your testimony. Uh hello. Uh my name is Leon Feineold. In 2017, my late wife Yuan and I co-ounded the House of Good Deeds to pay forward the help that we received when she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. We have grown drastically since then. We recently opened our first permanent headquarters. We managed four rescue transport vehicles and we serve all five burrows. Our volunteers partner with businesses and community members alike to rescue and redistribute essential goods at no cost to donors or recipients. And we do it bigger and better than anyone else. In 2025, we rescued five tons every month, more than half of it food. We run Manhattan's largest free store, offer free classes, and a volunteer hub, which has trained thousands of community volunteers, including those running our weekly food pantry, which I'm missing in order to be here. We also organize blood drives, neighborhood cleanups, electronics recycling, and are limited only by our funding. Based on the numbers we heard earlier today, 60 tons away from the wast the waste stream every year actually makes a dent. Keeping useful items and service is a win-win, and building community and changing attitudes among New Yorkers is the cherry on top. In 2023, this New York City council spent ent $3 million on Growen NYC and its stop and swap program, which offered many of the same services now offered by the House of Good Deeds like free collection and free distri free redistribution of clothing, shoes, housewares, and accessories, 85, 100 that year. In 2024, the funding was pulled by the Adams administration and Stop and Swap no longer exists. House of Deeds has filled that gap. Yet, we've received under $50,000 from the city council while having a significantly greater rescue impact. I ask this council and committee, what's left of it, to recognize the massive win-win that House of Good deeds has in reducing waste, promoting sustainability, and building community through volunteerism in each of your districts. Give us the money to replace our ancient vehicles, hire drivers, and pay our key people. maybe figure out a way to exempt us from congestion pricing and we will grow. We've applied for discretionary funds and need support. We're more efficient than anyone else who does what we do. We are New York City's best direct link between those who have and those who need. And the bigger and better we can be, the less cost and stress for the amazing people of the DSNY who keep our city running. Thank you. >> Thank you for your testimony. How do I get it to be? Oh, it's working. Um, thank you, Chair Sanchez and committee um for the opportunity to speak today. Um, and thank you for restoring community composting uh for funding for fiscal year 25 and 26 and we're hoping for 27. My name is Ellen Cooper. I am a master composter 2023 through the fantastic master compost program, a academy trash academy graduate from 2024, member of the Manhattan swab organics committee and former member of the swab. Um, as a master composter, I had the amazing opportunity to visit many of the composting the community composting sites around the city. I have seen firsthand the dedication, energy, extraordinary expertise and power of the composting community around the city, both paid and volunteer. It is interracial intergenerational knowledgeable, and passionate. I urge you to continue funding community composting. It is an essential part of New York City's citywide composting programs. It would have a destructive effect effect on the environment if it cut. The programs took decades to build and are now part of the fabric of our city. Um it's a tiny part of the budget, but the impact is huge. Um there are thousands of dedicated citizens both paid and volunteer who make the compost program one and run and millions of pounds of high-quality compost that make our parks, gardens, street trees, air and neighbors hoods healthier and flood resistant. We should be increasing community composting, not eliminating it. While it is still the whole curbside program is still in its infancy, community compost is the beating heart of the program. They work hand in hand. The citizen outreach and education provide by hundreds of community composters is irreplaceable. This is a volunteer army who support the small staffs and help build the co community compost program. the additional help and expertise to educate and inspire citizens, provide the food drop off places. The more people who learn about composting through community composting, the more likely they are to support the curbside program. Please keep it going. It's non-negotiable. Thank you. >> Thank you so much for your testimony and thank you to our first panel. Uh, next we'd like to bring up Mary Ellen Sullivan, Eric Goldstein, Justin Wood, and Christine Dates Romero. Thank you. >> Uh again, we'll start with stage left. You may begin. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman. Congratulations on taking this important post. I'm Eric Goldstein, New York City Environment Director at the Natural Resources Defense Council and um we're delighted to be here today. Uh there's a lot to talk about. I'll summarize my written testimony. Um as you know, the city spends about a half a billion dollars a year to export its waste to landfills and incinerators. From what we heard this morning, those costs are continuing to go up quite significantly. That's uh bad from both an environmental and public health perspective, as well as for the city's budget. Uh I'm going to focus for a moment on organics. The single largest portion of the waist stream. Of course, the top priority there should be food rescue and food diversion, which would also address the problem of so many people being food insecure in New York City. Right now, most of these organics are sent to landfills or incinerators. Making matters worse, those landfills and incinerators are usually in poor or black and brown communities. Um we've got a couple of recommendations. First, it's essential that the department be fully funded to provide a more comprehensive and broad-based educational effort to boost participation in this program, which as was noted earlier is much lower than in cities with mature composting programs like Seattle, San Francisco, and Portland. Uh we need these additional educational efforts along with enforcement to reach out to residents on a regular basis with in multiple languages in a variety of forums with specific initiatives uh to commit uh and communicate with building managers and landlords and school children. It's got to be a broad-based program. The the department needs to do more in that area. Second, we strongly urge the council to provide funding for nonprofit organizations that run community composting operations in all five burrows. NRDC gets no financial remuneration from that effort, but um and to its credit, the council stepped in last year to provide funding for 14 spectacular nonprofits across the city. These groups are the frontline champions of composting. U they help to reduce the amount of organics that must be landfilled or sent to incinerators. They produce useful finished compost that can replace chemical fertilizers, benefit our parks, landscapes, help street trees and uh gardens and house plants grow and they work across the burrows with our community gardeners and school children. Uh these organizations play an unheralded role in neighborhood revitalization. There's more we have to say about commercial waste zones, containerization, litter basket service, and lot cleaning, which are essential and always downplayed in the department's preliminary budget. And finally, we urge you to reaffirm support for the Glick Carpin packaging reduction and recycling infrastructure act. That's the EPR legislation the commissioner spoke about that could provide as much as $150 million a year according to the sanitation department back to the city from manufacturers and we hope the council will once again let everyone in Albany know of the city council's strong support for that state legislation. >> Thank you for your attention. >> Good afternoon uh Chair Sanchez and thank you for holding this uh meeting. Uh, my name is Christina Dats Romero. I'm the executive director of the Lower East Side Ecology Center and here to testify about the need to continue funding community-based uh, programs. The ecology center started its compost program in the 1990s to educate New York City residents about composting. Since the 90s, composting has gained in popularity with the implementation obviously of the citywide curbside program in 2024. While community composting programs have paved the way to implementing a universal collection program, our work is not done. Currently, the uh curbside organics capture rate is at 10% of its potential. Here is where community composting comes in. We are the trusted experts and play a crucial role in educating people about composting. When people see the composting process up close in their community, when they hold the finished product in their hands, utilizing compost to fertilize their gardens or street trees or taking care of their house plants, the reason to compost become tangible and they feel good. Compost by nurturing the soil nourishes a greener, healthier, more resilient city, creates community and creates green jobs. Right here in the city, there is a network of 15 organizations dedicated to turn food waste into finished compost. And as a member of the New York City Community Compost Network, we like to thank first of all the council for their support in the past and request that uh this support continue to uh go on in FY27. Thank you >> so much for your testimony. >> Hi, good afternoon, Chair Sanchez. Thank you so much for the opportunity to testify and committee staff. My name is Justin Wood, New York Lawyers for the Public Interest and a founding member of the Transform Don't Trash New York Coalition. We'll submit written testimony, but just wanted to get to three items about the FY27 budget. First of all, commercial waste zones. We urge the Mandani administration and council to continue realizing the full vision for the landmark commercial waste zone system by simultaneously uplifting historically exploited workers, eliminating millions of unnecessary truck miles from our streets, and diverting millions of tons of unnecessary commercial waste that's disposed in landfills and incinerators. We've got nine zones scheduled for implementation by August. We strongly support the continued and expedited roll out of this landmark reform and we note that the anticipated $7 million in administrative fees would cover many of these costs. However, in DSNY's first annual report on commercial waste zones, we were troubled that almost 3/4 of commercial waste in the initial zone was found to be disposed in landfills and incinerators. So we view this as a really unique opportunity for DSNY to more robustly invest in waste diversion, food rescue, uh food donation and other recycling programs in the commercial sector and urged that the budget include ample funding to ramp those programs up simultaneously with commercial waste zones outreach. Secondly, uh we urge the council and the budget to include funding for realizing the waste equity goals of the current solid waste management plan by utilizing at least one marine or rail transfer station to accept commercial waste and eliminate unnecessary truck miles from the commercial sector back and forth to outer burough environmental justice communities where the private truckbased transfer stations are located. This could be done in the form of a pilot program. for example, as the Manhattan commercial way zones are rolled out and we have an underutilized uh marine transfer station in Manhattan. Um I'll wrap up. Thirdly, um we strongly support robust uh infrastructure, public education and enforcement of both residential and commercial organics laws. Um, we also hope to see the department roll out plans and have funding to roll out plans for additional large or medium-siz compost facilities that replicate the success of the Fresh Kills facility in Staten Island. Thank you so much. >> Thank you so much for your testimony. >> Um, Chair Sanchez, um, committee staff, thank you for the opportunity to testify today. My name is Mary Ellen Sullivan and I'm chair of Brooklyn Swab and I'm here to share our all swab testimony. After nearly 40 years of relying on the same strategies to increase diversion without meaningful progress, it's time to try something different. New York City now regularly spends 500 million per year to export the majority of its residential waste, about 3.2 million tons annually, to landfills and incinerators outside the city. For fiscal year 2027, 480 million is budgeted and will almost certainly increase to over 500 million as exports costs are reconciled with actuals and increased fuel costs. Increasing diversion to recycling and composting will not significantly reduce these costs. Diversion programs require investments in collection and processing. However, 75% of the material currently exported is recyclable or compostable. Diverting that much material away from export to recycling and composting can generate important benefits in two critical areas. First, every dollar spent diverting material away from landfill or incineration reduces the negative environmental and health impacts associated with exporting waste to communities such as the Ironbound District in New York, New Jersey. Senica Metals landfill in upstate New York and Chester, Pennsylvania, also an incinerator. These impacts, including truck traffic, air pollution, and disposal burdens, are currently borne by communities both within New York City and in regions where waste is burned or incinerated. Increasing diversion could boost New York City jobs, tax revenue, and public investment. Imagine what spending 500 million on recycling, and composting could mean for our five burrows. Secondly, diversion directly improves condition on the street. When recyclable materials and organics are removed from the trash stream, the volume of bagged refu declines significantly and no longer attracts rats. Um, for this reason, it's extremely important uh to achieve the targets outlined in the draft solid waste management plan. It is uh 30% for residential and 54% for commercial and construction. This is not just a sustainability issue, but it's also an environmental justice issue. Thank you. >> Thank you for your testimony, and we will have the rest of it in the written record. >> Okay, great. >> Thank you so much to this panel. Uh we're going to take one of our online testimony before we move on to our third panel. Um because they have been patiently waiting. So I'd like to bring up our PS15 fourth graders. >> Okay. Good morning. Thank you, Chair Sanchez, and the sanitation committee for allowing us to speak today. >> We are fourth graders from PS and Red Hook Brooklyn. >> We live environmental justice zone in Red Hook with Brooklyn with a lot of traffic. >> Every culture taught is that there is no away for how trash. We learned that when our trash leaves our home homes or our school, first it goes to the Hamilton Avenue Wish Transfer Station nearby. >> Then it goes by truck to a barge at the Marine Terminal in Elizabeth, New Jersey. >> Then it gets trucked to a landfill all the way in Virginia. All that transportation creates pollution and the landfalls make kids just like us who live around landfills get asthma for life because of garbage that's not even theirs. How can the city zero waste plan be real if we keep hurting other community? We all need to work together to stop this waste before it starts. And that's what we're doing in our path of stopping waste before it starts. We we started the mindful choice program in our school two years ago. >> This year we our cafeteria food waste at the source by almost 45%. >> Cafeteria culture is doing mindful choice meals and a lot of schools now. We want all schools to have this program. >> We're talking our food waste out of the system to compost it and legally at Red Hook Farms >> and it's walking distance from our school. >> So, >> Red Hook Farm makes compost out of our food scraps and we visit them on field trips every year. We hope other schools can reduce their cafeteria food waste too and compost their food scraps locally to make less things place in all schools in New York City so we can stop hurting kids like us who live near landfills and far away places. We hope the city can support environmental education and local composting. Thank you to our PS15 fourth graders for your testimony. The kids are all right. Uh now we will bring up our third panel. Uh can we please have Justin Green? A lot of Justin's in trash. Uh Megan Ortiz. Uh Samir Rush. I hope I pronounced that right. If I didn't jam Oh, my bad. Jir Rush and Sydney Scott. It does not matter which order you sit. Uh just know that if you sit on the left, you will be speaking first. >> Mindful. That's the first time. Uh, good afternoon, Chair Sanchez and the sanitation committee. I'm Jir Rush. Thank you for this opportunity to speak today. I'm here as a direct I'm here as a direct result of quality environmental education funding. I was trained by Green City Force, an environmental education organization where I learned about agriculture, infrastructure, and composting. Now I work with Cafeteria Culture as their compost coordinator. This is a position created to pilot the possibility of replicating the practices of processing food scraps in nearby and nearby community composting sites in New York public schools and New York City public schools. Our work is also powered through New York City Council's discretionary funding. I work in cafeteria cultures partner schools to collect food scraps in the cafeteria and compost it locally. To date, I have collected more than 1,200 pounds of school food scraps. That amount is hairier than a fully grown Kodiak bear. At one partner school, we processed all of the food scraps we collect through a local composting site that is operated by our partner organization, Compost Power. In the cafeteria, I'm able to interact with all students in the school. I teach them what I learned in environmental education, that local composting keeps the resources in the community and reduces truck and reduces truck traffic. Middle schoolers typically walk up to me and introduce themselves and have regular conversations with me conversations with me. I'm sure my age and who I am makes me seem more approachable to them. In engaging with me, these students who are often hard to reach suddenly are exposed to composting agriculture and environmental equity. Through my pilot position as compost coordinator, I'm able to bridge school cafeteria food scraps collection with local solutions that directly benefit the community. With further funding, we will be able to we will be able to begin to scale these local composting pilots in the next year. Thank you for your testimony. >> Of course, >> and congrats on your first time. >> Appreciate that. >> Good afternoon, Chair Sanchez and the sanitation committee. Thank you for this opportunity to speak. I am Megan Ortiz and I work with capture culture as a member of the teaching staff as well as mentor and support our compost coordinator with his work in cafeteria cafeteria food scrap collection. I started as a cafeteria culture student in 2020 when I was a junior in high school and I became fully employed by them after working a waste audit in 2024. In complete honesty, I have always found it incredibly difficult to speak in front of groups of people to the point where I even deemed it an impossibility for myself. Me standing before you today is a testament to the work and teaching of cafeteria culture. They push you to always challenge yourself and show you that anything is possible. Capture culture makes it a point that every student we work with has the opportunity to engage with the content in a way that is comprehensible to them. That no student is left behind or feels as though their voice isn't heard. I remember meeting one of our current eighth grade students just a year ago when she was a seventh grader who was shy and refused to make eye contact. Now confidently running up to people in order to interview them for a community survey. It is with the experience I have gained from capture culture now as a teacher that shows me how it is incredibly important to meet students where they are. And that is a skill I hope to continue honoring in our work. Being consistent figures who are able to inspire students to see themselves active members of a community rather than a nuisance or passive recipient of the current conditions. It is because of the work cafeteria culture does that our children believe they're able to make a change. Our work is powered through New York City Council Council discretionary funding and through your greater investments in cafeteria culture. We hope to empower more students. I dream of a day where our work can reach children in all five burrows, inspiring the hope and the confidence that I have achieved through cafeteria culture. Thank you. >> Thank you for your testimony. >> Hi, I'm Justin Green. Thanks. I'm the executive director of Big Reuse. Um one of the groups that received funding from city council. uh when Mayor Adams cut funding in FY24 uh uh programs that had been in existence for decades got cut that uh at Department of Sanitation. So there really no more uh community- based programming at Department of Sanitation. There's not funded through city council. Um that funding that kicked in funded our work group work at 13 other groups across city cafeteria culture which you've heard is doing amazing work. Um, Earth Matter, Governor's Island, Red Hook Farms, uh, East New York Farms, Compost Power, BK Rot, New York Botanical Gardens, Queen Botanical Gardens, um, Snug Harbor, Earth Matter, Lori Side, Grown NYC, and Brotherhood Sister Soul. So, it's funding like groups across the city, all doing really interesting, innovative composting work. Um, that's really needed to educate people on composting. Right now, they don't have a budget besides this EPA budget. OMB is restricting DSNY in terms of outreach funding. So all the funding that's going for outreach is through city council and city council community based funding. Um they they have some EPA funding that they're going to use on mailers or or other stuff, but but out in the out in the community it's really groups like ours with our funding. Um at Big Reuse, we do a lot of different things. We do we have a mid-scale composting site in the Guanas. We'd love to have you come uh check out. Um, we opened a site in Central Park working with Central Park Conservancy to compost their yard waste. Um, we have 20 food scrap drop offs throughout the city. Um, we install wrap proof uh composting cubes in community gardens. We're at New Roots in your district. Um, working with a lot of programming there. Um, we distribute uh compost to schools, 60 schools, 400 bags of compost. We do outreach events, over 200 outreach events across New York City, reaching 10,000 um community members. Uh, and this our work in composting spawned our street tree care program which now cares for over a thousand street trees across the city. Um, and so we just want to we're here to encourage you guys to keep funding the the speaker initiative for community composting because it has had amazing impacts across the city. Thanks for your time. >> Thank you so much for your testimony. >> Hi, good afternoon, Chair Sanchez and members of the committee. My name is Sydney Scott. I'm a graduate student pursuing a master's in food systems. Thank you for the opportunity to testify and thank you to the city council for restoring community composting funding in fiscal year 25 and continuing the funding for fiscal year 26. I'm speaking today to strongly support ongoing stable funding for community composting through schedule Council initiative funding for community composting. When Mayor Adams cut funding to community programs at DSNY, the city council stepped in to save decades old programs that supported community composting, composting education, and outreach through New York City nonprofits. The ongoing support shows how composting impacts and engages the community. In my M's program, we discuss food waste often. Tackling the food waste issue can help our society in many ways, from easing hunger and food insecurity to mitigating climate change. But it wasn't the graduate education that taught me the value of composting. That came earlier from years of dropping off food scraps at green markets, volunteering at composting events throughout the city with organizations such as Growen NYC, and last year completing the master composter certification. All of this was possible because of city council funding. Despite what the federal government claims, climate change is real and it impacts us all. Food sent to landfills produces methane, a much more potent uh greenhouse gas than CO2. Composting can help address this issue by saving tons of greenhouse gas emissions. Let's work together to keep fighting climate change. I urge the council to continue funding community composting. Thank you. >> Thank you so much for your testimony and thank you to everyone on panel 3. Uh before we uh head uh completely to our Zoom testimony, wanted to make sure there were no last uh folks in the room that wanted to testify that have not already uh put in a request with the sergeant-at-arms. Growing once, growing twice, sold. Um, now I'd like to bring up uh Mary Arnold on Zoom, please. >> I'm testifying. >> Hi. I'm testifying for Civics United for Railroad Environmental Solutions, which formed in Queens in 2009 to address quality of life problems from antiquated freight locomotives and waste export by rail. The Department of Sanitation of New York kind of brags that 85% of waste exported from New York City is hauled at some point by freight rail. And this budget supports that business as usual export to disposal. But exporting waste by rail instead of using a different transportation mode doesn't reduce the tonnage or toxicity of waste. And it doesn't eliminate quality of life, health, and environmental problems in neighborhoods within and outside New York City, where all that waste is tipped processed hauled landfilled and incinerated. Using rail to export New York City's waste is nothing much to brag about. Capturing and diverting waste from export at the increased levels that are in DSNY's solid waste management plan draft would reduce neighborhood problems and really be something to brag about. Please shift existing funding to actions that support DSNY's 30% and 54% diversion goals instead of just business as usual funding of filthy unhealthy waste export by rail. Why do I say filthy and unhealthy? With few exceptions, the locomotives that haul waste are high polluting 1970s diesel technology. Especially during the warm weather months, municipal solid waste rail containers too often emit the stench rats love. Because a third of the material in the black bag trash is organics. Construction and demolition debris CND can contain heavy metals, PCBs, asbestous and other toxics. Yet CN is crushed, dumped, and hauled in open top rail cars with floor drains resulting in emissions of toxic blowoff, lee and gas. >> Your time is expired. >> Thank you. Thank you so much for your testimony and uh any of uh the uh testimony that you didn't get to, you can please submit it uh and it will be saved in the written record. >> I have done so. Thank you. >> Thank you so much, Mary. Uh can we please have Claire Mifflin? >> You may begin. >> Hi, I'm sorry I've lost my voice, but I'm going to try and send it in um as written as well. Um I'm in support of community con um of waste containerization and community composting actually. But in waste containerization I have ideas of how it could be improved. I mean our sidewalks are covered in bins and managing them is expensive. Our recent report the hidden cost of trash shows that small buildings pay over $100 per apartment per month to manage their waste. Often just taking it from bins on the sidewalk across to the street. Our solution of shared on street containers for trash recycling and organics used directly by residents could clean up sidewalks, increase diversion rates, and reduce operating costs. Large new buildings um shouldn't need empire bins. Also, they shouldn't be given hundreds of linear foot of curb space for permanent storage of their trash. Um, our solution, temporary rolling out of four-wheel bins that can be attached to the trash shoots means porters no longer need to lift tons of plastic bags per week and has been rolled out successfully in Hoboken um as a pilot and now is being permanent. Um, our report Curb Alert also looked at on street commercial waste containerization and interviewed small businesses who said how it was a problem for them to use these bins and have them um permanently outside their storefronts because people just put their waste in it passes by or residents living above. And Hollers said it was hard for them to make money on routes with low volumes of organics as they have to charge less. Again, shared on street containerization would help solve both of these problems and should be offered before DSMY start finding small mom and pops for not separating organics when it's so tough for them and when the chains are not doing it themselves. Um, I'd also like to ensure community composting continues to be financed. It'll have to be through city council in the next year or so, but I would like love to see it baselined in DSNY once the contract >> your time is expired. >> Thank you. I'm done. Thank you so much for your testimony. Uh, next, can we have uh Alex Stein? Thank you guys. I don't know. Can you hear me? All right, guys. I just want to start off by saying that I love Mayor Mom Donnie and I voted for him. I support him 100%. I like his wife and one thing, he handled all of the snow incredibly well. But he made a campaign promise that he was going to lower the prices of falafel. And I'm going to be honest, I eat falafel every day. I'm the plant-based pimp. And I feel like right now the prices are still pretty high because you guys are giving these people a lot of restrictions. So you guys need to reduce restrictions. So I I wrote a little poem. So Oh, forget that I ran mess. It's just sand and a bunch of stress. I'm hyp chickpeas clash in a pit of spice delight. Peters pounding hard through the day and night. Mom Donnie, you are a brown king. Walking around with your anti-sem like a bomb. G Heidi vibes strong. Keep the passion calm. Mom D, you are my mom. Love those terrorist riding on the camel. I don't give a dang cuz your food truck has a handle to my heart. It makes me fart. If I'm being real, I'll accidentally sh in the Apple store cuz I'm at the Genius Bar cuz I cracked my screen cuz a guy robbed me on the subway train. All I was doing was buying cocaine. Mom Donnie, you're the man. I'm your number one anti-mite. >> Thank you. >> Thank you for your testimony. >> And with that, uh the uh preliminary budget hearing for the uh committee on sanitation and solid waste management is officially closed.