Trash Piles Up In Northwest Queens After NYC Issues Vax Mandate

ASTORIA-LONG ISLAND CITY, QUEENS — Residents in Astoria and Long Island City reported nearly two times as much trash piling up on neighborhood streets in the last week, as garbage collection slowed after Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that all city workers need to be vaccinated against COVID-19 or be placed on unpaid leave.

There were 37 complaints of uncollected trash and recycling across Astoria and Long Island City's six ZIP codes the week after the mayor's announcement on Oct. 20, according to 311 data. The week before, by contrast, saw just 19 missed collection reports.

The complaints spiked in the days ahead of the Oct. 29 deadline for city workers to get one dose of the vaccine: an additional seven collection complaints were made in the area on Oct. 27 alone, data shows.

This trend extends beyond northwest Queens, too: four times as many New Yorkers called 311 to report uncollected trash after the city launched its new vaccine mandate compared with the month prior, Gothamist reported.

At a news conference this week De Blasio, who assumes that the slowdown is "related to people expressing their views on this new mandate," berated workers who aren't doing their jobs.

"Anyone who is not doing their job, you're harming your fellow sanitation workers, and you're harming your neighbors, and you're harming your city," de Blasio said. “And it's time to stop.”

Sanitation Commissioner Edward Grayson admitted in an interview with NY1 on Tuesday that there have been citywide collection delays, but attributed the slowdown to a "miscommunication" not a coordinated show against the mandate.

As of Thursday, 67 percent of New York City sanitation workers had been vaccinated; a 5 percent increase from the percentage of workers who were vaccinated before de Blasio announced the mandate, but still well below the 100 percent threshold or the 85 percent vaccination rate among adults citywide.

Other city workers have protested the vaccine mandate too. Throngs of firefighters and other municipal employees gathered outside Gracie Mansion on Thursday to rally against the mandate.

"This is a personal choice everyone wants to make for themselves," Andrew Ansbro, president of the Uniformed Firefighters Association told Fox News earlier in the day, adding that the union plans to file a lawsuit over the mandate.

Ansbro said that he is vaccinated, but other firefighters have some of the lowest vaccination rates of any city workers. Roughly 69 percent of all FDNY workers (including paramedics) had been vaccinated as of Thursday, with only 67 percent of FDNY firefighters having received at least one dose.

Joseph Mannion, president of the Sanitation Officers Association, worries that trash pileups might continue past Monday, if sanitation workers don't get vaccinated and the agency is left with a possible worker shortage.

In preparation, he said that the department has moved to snow season shifts — from eight hours to 12.

"Prepare for the worst and hope for the best," Mannion said.