The complex relationship between the District and federal governments can best be understood through garbage. If the federal government shuts down, city officials say there will be no trash pickup from residences for the first week. After that, the Department of Public Works will resume its garbage responsibilities.
That’s because “the District was at one time a federal agency and still hasn’t gotten out from under that classification,” Ward 2 D.C. Councilman Jack Evans explained. Unlike any other city in the nation, the local taxes D.C. collects can’t be spent on local services without Congress first giving its approval. Like the spending for any other federal agency, approval for the District’s funding is tucked inside the appropriations bill on which Congress can’t agree.
Back to garbage. Federal regulations allow city agencies to provide services that protect public health, safety and private property in the case of a shutdown. A DPW spokeswoman on Thursday said the agency’s director has determined that garbage in covered containers doesn’t provide a danger to public health until one week has passed. So after one week, DPW can resume trash pickup. The same reasoning extends to open trash containers on city streets, the spokeswoman said. Those pose an immediate health risk and will be emptied throughout a federal shutdown, with no delay, she said.
For the same reason, the fire and emergency medical services department will be allowed to continue saving lives to preserve public health, and the police department will continue its work protecting public safety and private property, city officials said. It has been determined, however, that parking enforcement doesn’t meet those definitions and so it will be shut down.
“This is the most recent, concrete example of what it means to be disenfranchised in this city,” Mayor Vincent Gray said Thursday morning on WTOP radio. He added that drivers in the city can “park with impunity” during a possible shutdown.
Evans said it’s also an example of why the city should focus on budget autonomy and then statehood.”We’ve put budget autonomy on the back burner and we shouldn’t have done that,” the councilman said. “Congress should exempt us from the shutdown because when the trash piles up in the street there will be hell to pay.”
