One Colorado city is looking at making abandoned shopping carts a public nuisance
The city of Thornton is looking to crack down on a growing problem that has become a nuisance for residents: stolen or abandoned shopping carts.
"We've gotten a lot of code compliance calls, reporting abandoned carts, the homeless people will use them," said Randy Grant, development director for the city of Thornton. "So, yeah, we're responding to what we feel is a need in the community."
"People (are) getting lazy and they don't care anymore," said Toby, one shopper in Thornton. "They don't treat and respect as far as the things that are here right now."
Grant says that's why they are moving forward with plans to create an ordinance that cracks down on abandoned shopping carts.
"Up until now, we haven't had a way to connect them back to the retailer and ask the retailer to pay the costs of the collection," said Grant.
The plan proposes creating a nuisance provision for abandoned shopping carts. Retailers will be tasked with either finding a way to collect these abandoned carts or they will simply be charged for the carts that are collected by a contractor chosen by the city to retrieve them.
"If you have people that are out collecting them on your behalf, at your cost, then we shouldn't find anything to pick up and you won't be responsible for paying for any," said Grant. "If you don't have a collection system, then we are going to be passing the costs through to you."
Grant says this proposal already has support from several major retailers in the city.
"These carts are expensive, they can be an upwards of $1,000 a cart, and so the retailers are interested in getting them back as well," said Grant.
The city still has not decided how much they will charge retailers for returned shopping carts, but they are working on drafting the ordinance to be voted on sometime in May.
"Right now, it kind of depends on how many carts a week they pick up and what that number is going to be, but we would take the cost of collection and spread it among the carts that are collected and the retailers that own the carts," said Grant.
