Pueblog USa
Tuesday, May 24, 2005
City Fathers Talk Trash…
...but not for long.
According to a report in today’s Pueblo Chieftain, the City Fathers have decided to quash an effort to deal with Pueblo’s biggest problem with respect to waste management; the inability to get people to get rid of their trash.
Yeah. I know. They’ve been talking about recycling a lot, of late. But that’s hardly a problem compared to the way some people refuse to deal with their own refuse. A recent Pueblo Neighborhood Partnership (PNP) meeting (see this report), indicated that some people involved with the annual clean-up efforts think a number of people are hording their trash until the event and a getting ‘discount’ on trash removal. From a public health perspective, not to mention property values and getting along with neighbors, unless they are irresponsible slobs too, this is not a good thing.
Why is trash important? More important than recycling? Well…maybe another item in today’s Pueblo Chieftain can shed some light on that.
Plague is indemic in the rodent population in Colorado; prairie dogs, ground squirrels, mice, rats, etc. People contract it in the state every years. But mostly those who live in close proximity to prairie dog towns, or so I understand it. Prairie dogs and rats don’t mix all that much. So, for the most part, there is not much chance of cross communications of the disease from the p-dogs to the rats.
The p-dogs live where people generally don’t live. The rats, on the other hand, do live where people live in concentrations. And, rats like to live in cluttered areas where there are lots of opportunities to hide from cats, dogs and people. So a trash pile is (1) a great place to hide and (2) a potential source of food. A rat can be very happy in such a pile. Raise a nice big family.
The problem will come when somehow the disease makes the jump from the p-dogs in the country and the rats in the town. How that might happen is up to speculation. But it can happen. Especially if the p-dogs move into open lots in town areas where trash allows for rats to have a happy home. Some rat, looking for better pickings could move through a p-dog town and pick up an infected flea along the way. Then, coming down with the disease, its fleas could spread it to other rats it encounters. From there, it’s only a short jump, for a flea, to some unfortunate person.
Recycling might work. But dealing with trash is much more important. And unless the City Fathers deal with matters in their proper priority, they are not going to be taken seriously by the citizens….except, perhaps, during the course of an election.