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GREENBURGH, N.Y. – Town officials are considering a crackdown on loose leaf collection.
The Greenburgh Town Council will hold a public hearing Wednesday on a proposal that would require residents to bag their leaves during the autumn if they want the fallen foliage to be picked up by town workers.
Supervisor Paul Feiner said the motivation behind the proposal is threefold. It would save the town money in leaf collection while preventing safety and drainage issues, he said.
“It would help keep drains clear and avoid flooding,” he said Tuesday at the Town Board work session. “And it will help keep the streets clean. I see a lot of positives.”
In December, the town eliminated leaf pickup from the budget, a savings of around $147,000, according to various estimates.
Admittedly, the leaf collection process wasn’t very good, Feiner said. Weather often delayed the process, sometimes into the spring.
But now town officials are hoping to replace the curbside pickup with bagged collection. Bagged leaves won’t enter the drainage system and contribute to flooding, officials said. And with the new law, the town would pick up leaves every week, quickening collection times.
Feiner said he hopes the requirement will also encourage residents to mulch their leaves.
“It’s easy, inexpensive and good for lawns,” he said.
And many villages in the town, like Elmsford, already require residents to bag their leaves, and have done so with great success, he said.
But critics, including members of the Edgemont Community Council, have noted that, according to Edgemont resident Stuart Seeley, a financial executive with Morgan Stanley, eliminating leaf pickup may cost the average homeowner about $600 a year, in bagging and mulching costs.
Collectively, what residents spend on bagging or mulching “is actually closer to 30 times the Town's savings,” the council noted on its Facebook page.
The Town Council is anticipating a vote on the issue May 1.
Comments (4)
This is a prime example of why I'm seriously considering leaving Greenburgh. There is only one able adult in my home, our income is 60% of what it had been in the past. I can not longer physically or monetarily make up for the lost town services. My home is situated in a way that I can not leave garbage at the curb as it is on a steep slope so I have to drag it out and chase the truck since garbage service has been cut. I can barely afford lawn maintenance and my landscaper said he will charge me $100 extra per month to mulch or remove leaves during the Fall months. My taxes are out of sight and I can't justify paying them any longer and the real sting is that you give free services, provide luxury services to those who don't pay taxes!
Paul, You have sucked the life out of the middle class in Greenburgh. The middle class simply can no longer afford to stay here. GOOD JOB!
When we announced the new policy last year I shared with residents e mails that I received from mayors of other villages who have had positive experiences with the changes.
Release Date: December 21, 2011
: EXPERIENCES FROM THE VILLAGES--REQUIRING LEAVES TO BE BAGGED
Yesterday, I sent out an e mail alert to residents asking for their thoughts on the town changing our leaf collection policy in 2012. I am proposing that we only pick up leaves that are bagged if they are left in front of homes. Four villages in Greenburgh--Ardsley, Dobbs Ferry, Hastings and Elmsford already have this policy in place. I contacted each of the Mayors and received the following response.
I am hopeful that the Town Board will change our policy as soon as possible so we can plan for an orderly transition from our current process (which is not working) to the more affordable and efficient leaf bag requirement.
PAUL FEINER
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ELMSFORD From: MayorElmsford
Sent: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 7:29 PM
To: Paul Feiner; brian smith; drew fixell; hartley connett; peter porcino; peter swiderski
Subject: Re: your experiences appreciated with leaf pickup
Dear Mr. Supervisor,
We have been bagging leaves for many years.
We buy the bags off County Contract and store them at the Highway Shop.
We bring loads of them to Village Hall for distribution.
We give the residents 20 free bags a year and they can buy as many more as they wish paying what the Village pays for them.
We never go past the 1st week in December picking up leaves, were always done by then.
We pick them up in bags in a garbage truck Mondays on the North Side and Tuesdays on the South Side of the Village.
Maybe once a season we do a Saturday to pick them up but this year we did not have to all done on regular time, no over time.
Picking them up in a garbage truck is much faster and you can do more.
The garbage truck compacts them, the vacuum or loading loose in trucks you can't.
That takes up a lot of space while not getting many in the truck.
Loose requires many trips to the dump because you can't get that many in the truck, which wastes time, fuel etc...
In the same 15 minutes of picking up loose leaves at one house we can do a whole street.
We can pick up half the Village in half a day in one garbage truck.
Pickup once, dump go on to another project.
The day before Halloween we pick up leaves on a special pickup so there are none in the Village for Halloween, safer no mess for trick or treaters.
Loose leaves on streets calls for accidents.
Kids playing in the leave piles get hit by cars driving through them.
Cars parked on loose leaves catch fire from the hot exhaust.
Loose leaves take up parking spaces.
Loose leaves clog the storm drains.
Loose leaves hard to get to when cars parked in front of them.
Loose leaves blow in neighbors yards after they just raked them up.
Loose leaves get plowed from the snow plows when not picked up.
Wet loose leaves are slippery and dangerous.
You will get some complaints the first year we got about 6 but they get used to it. The big houses with many trees mostly have landscapers.
Bagging is much better in my opinion.
Thanks Bob
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DOBBS FERRY From: hartley connett Sent: Thursday, December 15, 2011 3:38 PM
To: Paul Feiner
for Dobbs Ferry in a nutshell ...
Leaves must be bagged and put at curb.
The village no longer provides bags / residents must buy their own Branches and larger twigs should be bundled, also left at curb Similar to Hastings/Others the DPW have allowed larger branches to be put out after the winter and recent October storms; it took some time to get this all cleaned up ... it was painful Trees and large limbs have to be disposed of by professionals We also are encouraging people to Love Em and Leave Em with the leaves and compost on-site. We see more and more lawn signs from Landscapers promoting this, so it appears to be catching on.
HC
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HASTINGS From: Peter Swiderski [ Wednesday, December 14, 2011 2:21 PM
To: Paul Feiner
1) We require leaves to be bagged in paper bags and put at the curb. Until recently, we supplied the paper bags (annual cost $6K). Now we rely on the residents to buy their own.
2) We require branches and brush to be cut down to three-foot lengths and tied together with string to bundles no more than I think 30 pounds in weight and put on the curb
3) In the aftermath of this last October storm, we let people leave entire branches on the curb. There were tens of tons of debris and we finally finished the clean-up this last weekend, seven weeks later. Painful.
4) Trees and large limbs have to be disposed of by professionals
4) We are encouraging people to Love Em and Leave Em with the leaves and compost on-site. We are apparently having some success with that. No numbers yet.
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ARDSLEY From: Porcino, Peter Sent: Thursday, December 15, 2011 8:35 AM As the new Ardsley mayor, I don’t have all the facts and figures at hand. I believe our experience has been much the same as described by Peter S. and Bobbie.
If I could add, it is my anecdotal observation that bagging is more time-consuming. It has led many landscapers to conclude that it is faster and cheaper for them to haul the leaves away themselves rather than spend the time bagging them. I often see the landscapers’ trucks filled with leaves as they leave (no pun intended) town. This has the added benefit of vastly reducing the volume of leaves the Village is picking up and disposing.
We have been less formal, but as enthusiastic, as Irvington and Hastings in promoting “Love ‘em and Leave ‘em,” trying to get our residents to avoid shipping off their leaves in the first place, and mulching them and keeping them in place. I don’t have figures, but I just don’t see many residents placing their bags of leaves out for pick up anymore.
Peter Porcino****************************************************
There are more issues here than just not having leaves picked up. Go to ABetterGreenburgh.blogspot.com and read more about this topic and others. Here's the link: http://abettergreenburgh.blogspot.com/2012/01/ignoring-neighborhoods-and-picking-up.html
The previous writer here, Halmarc45, makes a lot of sense, and has continually proven and highlighted Mr Feiner and his constantly being wrong. Come to tonight's Town Board meeting to find out what else at Town Hall on Hillside Ave.
Let's see how this one plays out. The good reasons for bagging leaves (clogging sewers, keeping streets clean, saving the Town money) amount to "nice work if you can afford It". What Feiner doesn't say is that this is one more example of the Town shifting the work load and costs from the Town to the homeowner with the result that taxes won't go down when employees no longer have to pick up the loose leaves at curbside. Hell, Feiner isn't even offering to provide free bags from the $147,000 he claims will be saved.
As for mulching, here's another expense that Feiner says is good -- for homeowners. Apart from some basic inaccuracies in the advocacy for mulching, this is yet another shift to remove expenses shown previously as Town expenses and move them to the cost of maintaining a home with no corresponding decrease in Town taxes. Indeed, removing them from the Town tax bill which represents a tax deduction on your personal income tax filing now would see them appear as a non-deductible item on these tax returns -- just like moving the Greenburgh Water bill from Town taxes to a non-deductible provider.
Those with unimpaired memories will remember that taxes did not decline when the Town imposed curbside garbage collection.
It's not as though Feiner is seeking to save money in all areas -- just the ones that he calculates will produce the least resistance come re-election. If Feiner truly wanted to reduce expenses, surely he would take aim at the multiple summer camps run by redundant Town departments. If Feiner truly wanted to reduce expenses he would insist that revenues coming into the Arts Council would be directed to the Town's coffers and not used to hide the true cost of running a poetry contest or hanging artwork for sale. Have you noticed that fees for everything are going up -- that's another way to spell higher taxes. But if you're concerned about keeping the TZ Bridge open or promoting an electric pumping station you don't really have that much time to cultivate your own garden which, if anything, desperately needs mulching.
But the big whopper that Feiner keeps hiding is that the Town again has run in the opposite direction from revaluation -- a theme that Feiner periodically allows to float to the surface before burying it after putting on a show of good intentions. Meanwhile everything is just so good according to Feiner that those seeking certiorari are celebrating their good fortune in the reality that lower ratables continue to decline year after year despite Feiner delivering birthday greetings to Seniors.
But not to worry, thanks to interns and their certificates of appreciation, the revenue from the Court's processing of those 80-100,000 discovered tickets is sure to bring in as much as $4 million said Feiner a year ago. But Feiner shuts up when asked how much from only those tickets has been collected.
One thing is certain. As Town-provided services shrink or disappear completely, taxpayers need to see some of the benefits from these actions. While it is known that salaries and benefits affect the Town's annual expenses resulting in a hit of around 80% of costs, what tax benefit has been realized from a three year salary freeze and "alleged" (also spelled "a lie") hiring freeze and what's going to happen when it becomes impossible to continue in that vein. If you still can't see it happening here because a Nero fiddling while Rome burned seems remote, try watching the same work session producing today's media blip and see the Town Board spending the bulk of its time ruminating over how to recognize the Town's 225th anniversary. Another mission for Town Clerk Beville and her army of interns. Wasn't it Mickey Rooney who prodded another Judy, "Come on kids, let's put on a show."