The Queen’s Square temporary market has major garbage problems. There is a pile of uncollected garbage that’s stinking up the compound. In the words of one vendor who spoke to us off camera – the fault lies with the vendors themselves who hire drug addicts to dispose of their garbage; those addicts then empty out the garbage bags on the ground next to – not inside the bins and pick it apart for anything they might want to scavenge; and then, with all that mess there, the garbage trucks only come twice a week – when the mess is piling up daily. There’s enough blame to go all around but only one authority in the entire mix. Councillor Phillip Willoughby represents that authority and he said it’s as simple as bagging the garbage.
Phillip Willoughby, City Councillor
“The vendors are paying $5 per day to utilize the facilities at the temporary market and we are leasing the facilities to them from the Hotchandani group of companies. We have to pay a huge bill every month to use the premises. The utilization will be up to the latter part of May. The fee that they are paying, it is a small drop in the bucket compared to how the city is subsidizing them and facilitating them to utilize a prime piece of real estate to conduct business until the Michael Finnegan Market has been completed. Now Waste Control should pick up the garbage at least two times a week or every day because of north side/south side. It is a simple request that the department is making, please bag your garbage.”
Percy Murrillo, Operations Manager - Sanitation
“The fixing of the problem may be that the sanitation department will move in there everyday. We met in a meeting this morning and we will be doing that beginning Saturday or Sunday so I believe that the vendors or people who use the market won’t have a problem from here go back, the sanitation will take care of that problem.”
Jules Vasquez,
“Because right now you clean it once a week?”
Percy Murrillo,
“We are supposed to be making an agreement with BML to come in the morning and the sanitation department from the City Council will come in the night and do cleaning.”
Jules Vasquez,
“But I’ve seen that place manager, it is a mess. Garbage is on the ground, the place stinks, people are navigating through the garbage to pick out things they could eat.”
Percy Murrillo,
“It comes down to the same thing the councillor said a while ago, if we can get the people to bag the garbage then we will have less problem. These people have to learn the right way to discard your garbage. Put it in a bag and we will cart it away and I will forever be saying that. Put it in a bag and we will take it away.”
