Honolulu Avenue shop owners looking to solve trash issue
Business owners along Honolulu Avenue in Montrose are working with Glendale public works staff to remedy an ongoing trash issue that entails illegal dumping, overflowing bins and stores throwing away their garbage in the waste units of neighboring shops.
So far, the city has hired Jeffery Camera of Balliet, Camera & Howe Consultants, who gave a presentation on Thursday to the board of directors of the Montrose Shopping Park Assn. that included findings and photos.
Many businesses have trash bins in their rear parking lots that are used by nearby landscapers and gardeners for dumping waste such as tree stumps, contributing to the overflow, Camera said.
During his research, Camera found examples of trash bags simply being left next to trash bins.
“Some [people] are leaving bags right in front and think since it’s a business, a cleaning crew is going to come in,” he said during his presentation.
The city currently collects trash from 15 refuse bins belonging to shop owners along Honolulu Avenue, while others contract with outside companies for their services, said Tom Lorenz, public information officer with the city of Glendale.
Others, Camera said, don’t pay for collection services and were found to be dumping garbage in the bins belonging to their neighboring store owners.
Camera also conducted a survey of Montrose store and restaurant owners to gauge the severity of the trash problem. However, he said he would issue another survey this coming week after members of the board of directors said they never received one.
Once the survey is completed, Camera expects to make some recommendations to the city on how to tidy up Montrose streets and alleys in the heart of its shopping district.
One possible option he noted was creating enclosures for trash bins, a method Ken Grayson, owner of music store Grayson’s Tune Town, has employed.
Grayson keeps his waste unit behind a lock and key and said that, so far, it’s working well because only trash from his business has been going into the bin.
“My situation doesn’t really create a problem,” he said.
Steve Pierce, communications administrator for the shopping association who has avidly picked up trash as part of his own volunteer efforts, said another idea would be to align all business owners with a single entity, such as the city, to pick up trash.
That could trim congestion generated by having several trucks stopping by each week instead of one collecting waste from everybody, he said.
“We have four or five services in our area,” Pierce said.
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Follow Arin Mikailian on Twitter: @ArinMikailian.
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