MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Trash on South Memphis street was finally picked up Wednesday after WREG asked the city why some residents had been more than a month without garbage collection.
Kevin Bartlett showed WREG the trash piled up outside the rooming house he owns on Lowell Avenue. He said garbage crews hadn’t been by for the last 34 days.
“It’s unsanitary, unsanitizing to be able to live like this,” he said.
Down the street, WREG saw trash close to overflowing out of another resident’s trash bin.
“Sometimes, like, you know what I’m saying, the trash be overflowing and we be like, ‘Where’d the trash man go?'” said Michael Greene.
But further down Lowell Avenue, it appeared the trash had been picked up.
“We pay our light bills, I make sure everything gets paid around here like normal people, so how come our trash can’t get picked up like everybody else?” said Bartlett.
The city never explained why Bartlett’s trash and his neighbor’s trash was overlooked, but said that no one had reported the problem to them until WREG called.
Less than an hour later, a garbage crew arrived an emptied Bartlett’s overflowing bin.
“It took me to do that to get something done that was supposed to be done anyway, but man, just at the end of the day, I’m grateful that it got done,” Bartlett said.
If your trash isn’t picked up on time, the city urges you to call 311.