NYC Launches New Program To Keep Streets Clean
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- Mayor Bill de Blasio is unveiling a new program he believes will keep New York City's streets cleaner.
The program will step up anti-graffiti efforts, increase power-washing of sidewalks in busy commercial areas and bolster anti-litter efforts along the city's highways and onramps.
"Too often those ramps and the areas around them are too dirty, so we're going to be sweeping an additional hundred miles of ramps each week to get rid of the litter and the debris and the leaves," de Blasio said while announcing the plan Wednesday at a Sanitation Department depot in Manhattan.
The power-washing effort will initially focus on Highland Boulevard in Staten Island, Church Avenue in Brooklyn, the downtown Flushing transit hub in Queens, Jerome-Gun Hill in the Bronx and Broadway on the Upper West Side.
The plan, dubbed CleaNYC, will also increase the frequency of public wastebasket collections on weekends and holidays.
De Blasio said all five boroughs will be served because the city's residents "deserve clean streets.''
"You'll see this work all across our city," de Blasio said. "We are never going back to the bad old days in the city, not on my watch. I guarantee that."
The program will cost $4.2 million in expense funds in the upcoming fiscal year and $2.5 million in capital funds.
The plan will go into effect in all five of the city's boroughs.
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