Two weeks after Dallas switched to a new trash collection schedule to improve service, some residents complain service got worse.
City council members have also received complaints about delays and missed collection.
As of Friday morning, it was 18 days earlier when Northwest Dallas resident Tom Bloodgood’s trash was last collected. He used to have Monday pick-up, but the new schedule was to begin his collection on Friday, Dec. 9.
“And I've been calling 311 ever since a week ago, and no response. Their response is ‘we reported it to the Sanitation Department,’ and that's it,” he said.
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Another nearby resident, Chris Garcia, said the new schedule did not improve service.
“Let me know when that happens. Unfortunately, we just haven't seen it yet,” Garcia said. “I think as a neighborhood we try to be patient but we try to tell the city we certainly need them to be consistent when it comes to the pick up so you don’t have refuse flying all over the place in the alleys and the streets. It’s been a problem.”
Councilmembers Cara Mendelsohn and Gay Donnell Willis both told NBC 5 Friday that residents in their North Dallas districts have complained to their offices about missed collection with the new schedule.
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“I don't think enough of leadership was scrutinizing the data because there are tools that sanitation is equipped with tools to gauge when pickups are happening,” said Willis, who represents the neighborhood where Bloodgood and Garcia live.
Trash collection is not the only City of Dallas delay adjacent to Tom Bloodgood’s home. Traffic signals at a Midway Road intersection have been temporary ever since the permanent signals were destroyed in a 2019 tornado.
Red tape with federal money that was to help replace them never came through, and then supply chain issues are blamed for the long replacement delay.
Bloodgood said pavement repair was delayed behind his home adjacent to construction for a replacement school because of a very long wait for a city inspector.
“Their contractor was waiting six months when I talked to him for the city to come out and inspect it,” Bloodgood said.
Around noon on Friday, a city garbage truck passed close to the overflowing trash containers but drove off in another direction.
“And since you and I spoke I had another conversation and learned a little bit more and asked that the attention be given to this that it really needs to have. It’s just inexcusable,” Willis said.
After that response from Councilwoman Willis, a city sanitation crew did collect the trash on Tom Bloodgood’s street later Friday afternoon.
He hopes the collection problem is solved.
The street repair is now under construction. The traffic signals are approved for replacement but that work has not begun yet.
ONLINE: Find details about your Dallas trash collection schedule here.
