(Two Videos Below) Mayor Bloomberg will order a probe into allegations that Sanitation Department told drivers to snarl the cleanup effort to protest budget cuts, saying this morning it “would be an outrage” if workers intentionally did not clear streets.
“We’re going to investigate,” Bloomberg said at a news conference in Queens when updating reporters on the latest blizzard cleanup effort.
The Post reported today that a group of guilt-ridden sanitation workers confessed their protest plot to City Councilman Dan Halloran (R-Queens).
The workers were fuming over recent job cuts and cutbacks, the councilman and other sources told The Post.
“I don’t think it took place,” Bloomberg said of the meeting involving Halloran and workers.
He added, “It would be an outrage if it took place.”
Sanitation Commissioner John Doherty said, “We’re going to look at it.”
On the effort by workers, Doherty said, “They showed up and they did their jobs.”
Earlier this morning, Gov. Paterson said a probe should be launched.
“This would be a very, very serious breach,” Paterson told WOR 710-AM on his, adding that it “would be better for there to be an investigation about the allegations.”
Bloomberg, speaking earlier today on Staten Island, had dismissed the allegations.
“I don’t know whether anybody, you know, one person or two people, slowed down,” he said. “Probably you’ll never know. But the men I know who work for the Department of Sanitation take great pride in what they do. They work hard … I would send them out in the next storm without thinking twice.”
THE FOLLOWING IS A VIDEO OF THE MAYOR TAKING A TOUR OF THE FIVE BOROS THIS MORNING:
Halloran told The Post that he met with workers.
“They sent a message to the rest of the city that these particular labor issues are more important,” said Halloran, who was visited yesterday by a group of guilt-ridden sanitation workers who confessed the shameless plot.
Halloran said he met with three plow workers from the Sanitation Department — and two Department of Transportation supervisors who were on loan — at his office after he was flooded with irate calls from constituents.
The snitches “didn’t want to be identified because they were afraid of retaliation,” Halloran said. “They were told [by supervisors] to take off routes [and] not do the plowing of some of the major arteries in a timely manner. They were told to make the mayor pay for the layoffs, the reductions in rank for the supervisors, shrinking the rolls of the rank-and-file.”
(Read More: NY Post)
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8 Responses
Mr mayor, now you’re outraged. But it’s all your fault.
People died because of you.
As wrong as the sanitation dept was, YOU caused it.
You killed people.
You killed time and money.
You killed our city.
If this true Mr Bloomberg should do what President Reagan would have done…fire them all and start over!!!!
Marty Markowitz– yes, I saw 3 trucks go down my block (the only 2 way thru street amongst many dead ends), BUT THEY ALL HAD THEIR PLOWS A FOOT OFF THE GROUND!!
Too little, TOO late. Pass the blame around.
Bottom line WE suffered.
Last night in Staten Island, a sanitation truck came down the block with his plow off the ground and didn’t use the salt in his truck. He probably reported that he went down the block though he accomplished nothing.
Did someone suggest to the mayor that he should bentsch sechiyanu on finding a scapegoat (other than himself).
P.S. Note that he has NOT blamed global warming – proving he really isn’t a liberal Democrat pretending to be something else.
you are all correct.These guys were the CAUSE of people dying,women giving birth out of the hospital and many many hard working people loosing their wages because they couldn’t GET TO WORK.They should all be fired just like the air controllers during President Regan era.
I’ve heard story after story of plows with their blades up in the air. I saw it myself. I wonder it they thought no one would notice.
The outrage at Bloomberg is not so much at the failure of the Sanitation Department to do their job as it is at his attitude. For days, he said everything was fine, that Times Square was clear so the tourists could go to Broadway shows. Only when he finally realized that the citizens count too, and that they were seething, did he admit that maybe they didn’t do a great job.