Galvan Ain't Nothin' But Trash

Just once (or maybe twice), I would like to be a fly on the wall at a Galvan manager's meeting where they discuss their plans for the week or month.  Like recently when they decided to replace the large dumpster in the alley behind their building at the intersection of 2nd and Warren Streets, known as 201-203 Warren.  Dan Kent, or some other manager-type, may have told everyone in attendance:  "Let's get a smaller dumpster for the building, lock it, and not allow our tenants unlock it.  Let them leave their trash on the ground near the dumpster.  This is working just fine near the alley behind our apartment complex in the 200 block of State Street where there hasn't been a garbage dumpster for 8 months, and our tenants, their neighbors, and the city of Hudson don't seem to mind.  We are not required to provide garbage dumpsters for our tenants anymore." 

Some of you may recall the dumpster behind Galvan's building at 201-203 Warren from at least two postings on Gossips of Rivertown over the years when the dumpster was often an overflowing disgrace that neither Galvan (and the previous owner of the building) nor the City of Hudson seemed to care about.  Read one article here: Trash Talk.  Leave it to Galvan to resurrect the problem.  Leave it to Hudson City Hall to allow Galvan to do whatever they please, no matter how blatant a code violation or quality of life issue it is.

I first noticed the new, smaller dumpster behind 201-203 Warren last week, with a pair of full garbage bags on the ground next to it.  Unlike their previous infamous dumpster ever was, this one was locked.  Then, this week, several bags of trash were on the ground next to the locked dumpster, many torn apart and/or unsealed, some with food, a foul smell and no shortage of insects feasting on the offerings.  This morning, two days later, the situation was worse.  Dumpster still locked, at least two additional bags on the ground, more insects, more bags ripped into, with more trash and food strewn around, obviously thanks to vermin.

This was the scene 4 days before things
got really ugly

201-203 Warren houses the bodega facing Warren and the Rolling Grocer store on 2nd, as well as apartment units (how many, I do not know).  The Rolling Grocer now seems to have their own trash receptacle (the plastic, two-wheeled one in the picture), and they and the bodega leave all their boxes out for DPW.  The building was assessed this year for $450,000, about two-thirds of which is tax-exempt.

Galvan still has not replaced the garbage dumpster for their tenants at their apartment complex in the 200 block of State Street -- the dumpster that fell on and killed a sanitation worker in late October of last year. The amount of trash on the ground there yesterday, when I did not have the ability to take a picture, was obscene. Instead, I include pictures from a few weeks ago of trash there that should have been in a dumpster.  Imagine like 5 times as many trash bags on the ground, with most of the bags ripped into by animals, and that's what it was like yesterday.

After successfully listening in on Galvan's meeting about their new garbage dumpster, I would have buzzed on over to the Hudson Code Enforcement office to get an idea of what they do all day.

Mayor Kamal Johnson can be reached at 528 828 7217.  No matter where you live in the city, garbage left on the ground attracting vermin affects us all.  What Galvan is doing cannot be acceptable in a supposedly civil society and city in the 21st century.