Ethics investigations and intense media scrutiny have not discouraged one group of city residents from making their mark on City Hall.
In fact, their continual presence and flagrant violation of proper etiquette has just cost city taxpayers $36,000. At least that?s what the Board of Estimates recently awarded a company to clear the pigeon droppings from the upper ledges of City Hall.
“The waste had been accumulating,” said Gordon Hubbard, an environmental technician for the city who supervised the clean-up.
“It can be a health hazard if breathed.”
Hubbard explained that the city used to have a wire that ran a low electrical current along the upper ledges of the building to discourage pigeons from congregating. But Hubbard said that system wasn?t reliable.
“Being outside, it would stop working.”
To fix the problem, Retro Environmental Inc. used a hydraulic lift and what Hubbard describes as “plastic shovels,” to scrape the droppings off the building.
Hubbard said the process is painstaking, and that using water was ineffective.
“When the waste gets wet, it goes everywhere,” Hubbard said.
After the waste is removed, it is placed in plastic bags and carted away. Hubbard, for one, is not a fan of pigeons.
“I think they?re dirty,” he said of the city?s uninvited guests. “They don?t care about anything.”
Council Member Robert Curran, D-District 3, is a bit more philosophical about the problem, noting that dealing with unruly pigeons is only one of many hardships a politician must endure.
“Part of being in city government you get dumped on daily,” Curran said.
“The pigeons are just taking their turn.”
