Heaps of garbage have been piling up across New York City as about 1,440 of the city's 7,200 sanitation workers, nearly 20%, are placed on administrative leave for not complying with Mayor Bill de Blasio's vaccine mandate for municipal workers – which Mayor-elect Eric Adams has promised to revisit.
Adams won yesterday's mayoral election with a landslide 68 percent of the vote over Republican opponent Curtis Sliwa's 28.8 percent. He has already promised to sit down with unions to negotiate vaccine mandates that have not only impacted waste collection throughout the city but have also stretched the FDNY thin.
As of yesterday, 23 percent of the FDNY's 11,000 firefighters are still not vaccinated and few have been given religious or medical exemptions, meaning 2,530 who haven't had the shots yet cannot report for duty.
2,300 are on sick leave, meaning nearly a third of the force's 11,000 uniformed firefighters aren't on the streets.
What has been on the streets, however, is an inordinate amount of garbage bags piling up since Monday.
A woman nonchalantly passed heaps of garbage on 43rd Avenue in Queens on Wednesday
About 1,440 of the city's 7,200 sanitation workers, nearly 20%, were placed on administrative leave Monday for not being vaccinated. A slowdown in pick-up has already begun, as seen in the above photo at 43rd Avenue in Queens
Garbage has been piling up across the city as a result of the shortage in staffing and due to a protest of outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasio's vaccine mandate. Above, a family walks past the waste on Seventh Avenue in Manhattan
People walk past past uncollected trash along 54th Street. 1,440 of the city's 7,200 sanitation workers, nearly 20%, have been placed on administrative leave
'Most of my neighbors work for the city, and they're supporting the sanitation workers. But if this continues, the situation is going to be unbearable,' Juan Cuautle, a nonprofit worker in Staten Island – where the issue is at its worst – told Gothamist.
'It's going to get bad in the streets,' Wendell Rivera, a 29-year-old sanitation worker who has requested a medical exemption, told the news outlet. 'The garbage is going to pile up. We already have enough manpower problems.'
But de Blasio dismissed the issue and said that there has been a 92% compliance rate among city workers, although about 9,000 were placed on unpaid leave Monday, while another 12,000 have applied for religious or medical exemptions that could take days to weeks to review.
De Blasio announced the vaccine mandate on October 20, removing a weekly testing option and offering a $500 incentive for the jabs.
From October 24 to October 30, complaints about trash increased ten times from the previous month in Staten Island.
Mayor-elect Eric Adams has already vowed to revisit the mandate by negotiating with unions across the city. He is above trying a vegan sandwich at at Marinello's Gourmet Deli in Brooklyn
Adams won yesterday's mayoral election with a landslide 68 percent of the vote over Republican opponent Curtis Sliwa's 28.8 percent
Since the mandate went into effect, employees told Gothamist that they have received substantial bonuses in exchange for helping to cover routes that have not received trash pick-ups. But other workers are intent on sending a message to the city.
Brian, a Staten Island sanitation worker who declined to give his last name, told Gothamist that he is vaccinated but supports his colleagues' protest. 'You leave stuff out, you leave stuff out. I'm sure the job didn't get done to the city's satisfaction today.'
Despite the number of garbage heaps piling up throughout the borough, a number of residents are encouraging the protest to continue in solidarity with the sanitation workers.
'There's no question people are upset their garbage is not being picked up. But I'd say there's also support for the people not picking up. We're a place that really does care about our city workers. The anger is aimed at the mayor,' Councilman Joe Borelli, a Republican who represents the
