101 N Street, NW

Update from DPW: “A DPW crew has serviced this trash can to support cleanliness and safety for nearby residents. We are working with our agency partners to ensure consistent long-term management of these cans.”

“Dear PoPville,

I read your post about a public trashcan that no DC agency wants to take responsibility for and I thought to myself “Did I accidentally black out and email PoPville??”

I’m a first-term ANC Commissioner in Truxton Circle, representing a district centered around Dunbar High School. There is a pair of trashcans that are along the public right-of-way in front of the athletic field that were installed by, and are supposed to be maintained by, Dunbar HS. Because the cans are publicly accessible, they are regularly used by neighbors as well as Dunbar students and visitors. The Dunbar custodial staff (which may be Department of General Services [and not DCPS] employees, it’s not entirely clear to me), basically do not believe they need to take responsibility for these cans because neighbors use these as public trash cans. As a result, the trash cans are, on a near-weekly basis, overflowing with trash. Check out the attached email (see below) for an example of the response I’ve gotten. At one point the custodial staff told me I should hold a community meeting to encourage neighbors to stop using the trashcans!

The crazy thing is I’m actually very sympathetic to the notion that Dunbar shouldn’t be the entity responsible for these. (more…)