'Afraid To Go Out There': Rats Plague Medford Neighborhoods

MEDFORD, MA — Rat trapper is a job Laroy Harding never thought he'd have, but he's gotten pretty good at it.

His wife, Ashley Lazonick Harding, said he's been catching at least one rat almost every day for the past two months. There was a two-week stretch where he caught 25. Another time he said he caught eight in four hours.

And that's just in his yard. His neighbor, Toni Silvesteo, said over Fourth of July weekend – a "disaster," as she dubbed it – Harding caught four rats under her porch. Silvesteo has lived in her house on Royal Street in South Medford for 62 years. This is the first year she's seen a rat.

"They are bold, and they come out during the day," Silvesteo told Patch. It's gotten so bad she won't go into her yard anymore.

"I have not been able to use my yard all summer because I'm afraid to go out there," Silvesteo said.

The Hardings moved to Medford 13 years ago. They, too, said they'd never seen a rat before this summer. And now the rats are piling up; at one point the family had what Lazonick Harding described as a "barrel full of carcasses" in their yard.

The neighbors said they've struggled to get help from the city. The Hardings first contacted the Board of Health two months ago, following up with the mayor's office July 5. Silvesteo started with Animal Control and then the Board of Health, which has visited both yards over the last two months.

But officials say there's little they can do when it comes to private property. Health Director MaryAnn O'Connor wrote in an email to Patch that bait cannot be placed on private property, but the city has hired an exterminator to inspect neighborhoods, identify potential food sources and conditions favorable to infestation, called harborages, and to bait public areas.

The issue isn't confined to South Medford. Susanne Higgins, who lives off of Fulton Street in North Medford, had a rat run between her feet in early July. Around that time, her kids saw a "very large" rat run out from under the base of a basketball hoop, she said.

Higgins posted on a local Facebook group July 9. In the past month, she said her post has garnered more than 150 comments from people who have "personally seen them in the yard, dead ones in the street, trapped them or hired exterminators out of their own pocket."

The Board of Health visited Higgins's house three weeks ago, but the problem has only gotten worse, she said. She hired her own exterminator to come out once a week and contacted the mayor and three city councilors. The city's exterminator baited sewers in her neighborhood Tuesday and told her he had already done several other areas.

But Higgins feels the city hasn't done enough.

"We pay a lot of money in taxes to live in this city," she said. "The city has to do more to educate the public, (and to) have more than one guy who takes 3 1/2 weeks to get out here."

O'Connor said the rat issue is "widespread," and not just in Medford. Experts believe it is a byproduct of the coronavirus pandemic, which closed the restaurants whose dumpsters are a primary food source for rats.

Construction is another contributing factor – the Board of Health monitors work sites to ensure they continually bait, but O'Connor said some are more compliant than others.

The Board of Health is working to address unkept yards, wood piles and other potential harborages. It has been inspecting dumpsters and found many to be in disrepair or not appropriately managed, O'Connor said.

"I know there is frustration and concern out there, and we are working to identify hot spots and address," O'Connor wrote in an email. She added that Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn is supporting the effort by seeking additional funding and holding meetings to discuss problem areas around the city.

Residents are advised to remove pet waste, pet food and water sources and unkept gardens from their yards.

"If there isn't a food source or water source nearby, rodents won't stick around," O'Connor wrote.

Despite the city's effort, the Hardings feel like they are juggling two pandemics. Their 7- and 13-year-old children are "terrified" of playing outside, and the infestation cost them a vital space during the shutdown, Lazonick Harding said.

"We're stuck here working, and your little outdoor space in your yard is all you've got right now," she said. "Having a rat pandemic on top of it has been pretty horrible."