Trash still piling up in pockets of Jacksonville

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – It’s been over three months since recycling has been suspended in Jacksonville. That action is supposed to allow the city to catch up on trash and yard waste pick up. In most neighborhoods, that has happened. But there are pockets in Jacksonville where trash is piling up and people are asking why.

Russ Beechly is one. He lives off of Hammond Boulevard on the Westside. He says regular garbage pickup, which is supposed to happen once a week, hasn’t happened in over three weeks. Beechly is confused because he thought that when the city suspended recycling, it was supposed to fix this problem.

“The lack of garbage pickup is happening way too often, and it makes our area look like a trash bin,” Beechly said.

Also on the Westside, off Collins Road, people in one neighborhood say their yard waste has not been picked up since October. In fact, one man, who asked not to be identified, said he was cited for burning leaves. He said he did it because the city would not haul them away.

The city continues to get complaints.

The highest number of complaints about garbage came the first week of October when there were 1,822. In November, that number dropped to 551 complaints. In December, that number went down to 284 at one point, but now it’s jumped up to 685. According to the city, that jump in the first week of January is due to federal holidays that week when trash wasn’t collected and increased trash and recycling because of the holidays — something the city sees every year.

News4JAX is also getting updated on the cost to operate the recycling drop-off points. At the end of December, more than $142,000 have been spent on just paying overtime for city employees to operate these sites. Most of that is cleanup and maintenance, but over $67,000 in overtime has been paid to firefighters to drive trucks to haul away some of the trash.