The ‘Parker piles’ of trash take their toll as residents navigate pest control and dumpster feuds in the DC 33 strike

Day 1 of a strike by 9,000 municipal workers in Philadelphia shocked even the most hardened olfactory senses as bags of seeping garbage quickly formed pungent mountains before the city skyline.

By Day 3, some had dubbed the city’s new contours “Parker piles,” laying blame at Mayor Cherelle L. Parker’s feet, as the streets felt increasingly apocalyptic.

But if this is anything like the 1986 strike, the city’s landscape will only grow more grotesque with each added trash bag left to stew in the sun.

Across the city last week, residents stared down the long, hot holiday weekend, worried about the fresh feasts that would accumulate for rodents. Sixty temporary trash drop-offs offered relief to many households, but people like Robert McCann, 87, said they could not take advantage of them because of physical limitations.

“What am I supposed to do if I don’t have a car — and I don’t mean this lightly — Uber, Lyft, or taxicab?” he said.

As negotiations dragged on between the city and District Council 33 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which includes the city’s sanitation workers, residents became increasingly panicked by what they saw at their doorsteps and kitchens. The strain was felt in every corner of Philadelphia, from neighborhoods that already struggle with littering and illegal dumping to sections of the city that typically do not worry about unwanted critters.

At a drop-off site at 5000 Wyalusing Ave. in West Philadelphia, residents said they already deal with pests and bugs coming from the nearby Cathedral Cemetery. On Thursday, dozens of trash bags and pieces of garbage were stacked up along the sidewalk; a smaller group of bags spilled onto the road and slowed traffic across the street.

“It’s gonna leave the city nasty,” said Ivion Preston, 32, after dropping off a bag of trash. “They need to stop being cheap with the pay.”

Christel Coleman, 53, who lives just a few houses down from a temporary dumping site at 50th and Locust Streets, said she is worried that the dumpsters and overflowing trash will bring pests to her home.

“You see the trash juice already,” she said.

What’s more, residents report disarray at drop-off sites, with people dumping construction materials or bulk items, such as mattresses.

The city has tried to establish some form of order by asking residents to refrain from placing their garbage on the curb and using drop-off sites only on their designated pickup days. So far, the asks have no way of being enforced and the vendors stepping in to empty out the dumpsters have had a difficult time keeping up.

Infestation concerns are not unwarranted, according to Michael Bentley, an entomologist who is the vice president of the National Pest Management Association.

Trash piling up can quickly cause rodents and insects to multiply, he said, putting residents at risk of the diseases they spread. As bags are torn open, trash can also attract larger scavengers like opossums and raccoons.

“Everything pests want and need is in a trash bag,” Bentley said. “If you put your trash bag outside, you’re ringing a dinner bell for cockroaches and flies.”

To the chagrin of residents, pests don’t need much time to take advantage of the smorgasbords in the hotter months.

Bentley said a week can be enough time to create a “ticking time bomb.” Flies can breed inside a single trash bag in a can without a lid in that time, while mosquitoes can lay eggs, needing only a bottle cap’s worth of standing water to do so.

Mosquitoes can carry illnesses like West Nile virus, and rodents and flies crawl through bacteria and pathogens outside that they can then track into a home if they gain entry, potentially spreading gastrointestinal diseases. Rodents can also carry fleas and ticks into a house. Urine from mice and feces from cockroaches can also cause respiratory symptoms or exacerbate asthma, an issue typically avoided with proper waste elimination practices.

Bentley said if residents cannot take trash to a drop-off point, they should keep garbage in sealed containers as far away from points of entry as possible. People living near drop-off sites, where large piles of trash have been accumulating, are in a more difficult situation, Bentley said. He recommends being extra diligent about not storing any trash inside their homes, removing clutter from outside their homes where pests could hide, and making sure screens are properly installed on windows or keeping them closed.

Pest management professionals can also inspect their homes to make sure insects and rodents cannot get inside, he said. Professional help, however, is not financially feasible for many residents, and others say the onus should not be on them.

Coleman, the resident living a few houses down from a drop-off site, said she has had no rodent issues in the 20 years she has lived in the neighborhood and believes the city should pay for pest control for her and her neighbors, considering they received no warning or say in the dumpster placement.

“This is unfair to us,” she said. “No one asked us, informed us. We woke up Monday and there were dumpsters at the corner.”

For its part, the Health Department said its vector control services program continues to receive and respond to complaints of rats and mosquitoes. Residents plagued by vermin can call 215-685-9000 for support.

Unfortunately for Philadelphians, Bentley said, even if the strike ends tomorrow, ”the bell’s already been rung” and the trash has likely already attracted more rodents and insects than usual.

“When the waste is inevitably removed, all the pests are going to go, ‘Well, this food is gone, but all these homes are here. It’s time to check them out,’” he said.

Some residents are trying to get ahead of the expected groundswell of pests by hiring contractors.

Ricky Moore, 34, has been hauling trash from people’s homes to the temporary drop-off sites for a small fee, though he said he has not charged seniors.

“They don’t want it in front of their house,” he said of the high demand while throwing bags of trash from the bed of his truck into the dumpster at 25th and Spruce Streets. “Somebody gotta do it.”

Moore said he and a couple of other men hauled trash from more than 125 homes Wednesday in Northeast Philly and Olney. Already, Moore said, he has seen an uptick in rats.

“Daytime, nighttime, they don’t care,” he said. “They’re out there.”

Still, it’s not just vermin people are worried about.

The heat, the trash, and this weekend’s holiday celebrations, which will only turbocharge the piles of refuse, have put negotiations between the city and DC 33 under mounting pressure.

Parker went so far as to address union members directly Thursday atop the Philadelphia Museum of Art steps, skeptical that they were aware of the offer the city had made them, lambasting union leadership for not coming to the negotiating table. Below her, DC 33 members and supporters brought an inflatable “Scabby the Rat” to protest contract workers hired to set up for the Wawa Welcome America concert on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway slated for Friday.

“You can threaten me with not supporting me if I decide to run for reelection,” she said. “You can call me a one-term mayor, but I’ll tell you what I will not do. I will not put the fiscal stability of the city of Philadelphia in jeopardy for no one.”

Residents, frustrated by the heaps of food and dog poop bags, mixed with construction material, were similarly getting more on edge. Debates broke out online about whether using the drop-off sites is crossing the picket line, while people who offered trash pickup services online risked being called scabs.

Meanwhile, residents next to the dumpsters took offense to people dropping truckloads of garbage bags on their blocks.

Coleman said she has seen multiple heated disputes between people coming to drop off large loads and neighbors who tell them to take it elsewhere or keep it off the street.

She said she called the mayor’s office to say the strike needed to come to a conclusion soon. Otherwise, she said: “Someone is going to end up dead.”

Staff writers Fallon Roth and Beatrice Forman contributed to this article.