Neighbors may get more notice at street-sweeping time
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Columbus is working on a plan to notify neighborhoods earlier when street-sweeping crews are due.
Streets in some neighborhoods, such as German Village, Italian Village, Harrison West and those near Ohio State University, are swept each month and have signs posted listing the days when people need to move their cars. But others don't have the signs.
Such is the case on E. Oakland Avenue, where a street sweeper went through on April 8.
The city notified the news media the day before that streets in the University District would be swept. Roger Deal came across the notice on the Dispatch website that night, but that didn't give him and other leaders of the Northwood Park neighborhood time to tell residents to move their cars.
So he watched the sweeper run down the middle of the street, unable to reach the leaves and debris along the curb.
"They really didn't clean anything," Deal said. "It's a waste of time, a waste of tax dollars. We get no benefit at all."
The city's public-service director, Mark Kelsey, has asked his staff to develop a plan to notify neighborhoods earlier, said Patti Austin, planning and operations administrator in the city's traffic division.
Officials might work closer with area commissions and civic associations to get the word out, she said.
Northwood Park leaders were particularly unhappy because this likely is the only time their streets will be swept this year. In the past, the city also has cleaned the streets during Ohio State's spring break or in June after most students are gone, when fewer cars were parked on the streets.
Resident Don Newton would call the city to work out a date, giving neighbors time to post signs and distribute fliers to let people know what day their street would be swept.
But this year, Austin said, city crews are tied up fixing potholes and 60 miles of alleys, and the city has fewer workers and equipment for sweeping.
The city's 311 call center didn't receive any complaints from other neighborhoods, public service spokesman Rick Tilton said.
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