Boston kicks Republic to the curb; will start imposing fines over trash strike

Boston city officials said Wednesday that they’ll start fining trash hauler Republic Services directly — instead of businesses — for uncollected garbage as a strike with union workers drags on without any end in sight.

The ongoing work stoppage is “taking an unacceptable toll on Boston’s residents, businesses, and neighborhoods,” Mayor Michelle Wu wrote in a Wednesday letter to the company’s president, Jon Vander Ark.

Wu said her office has “received complaints from various neighborhoods that overflowing dumpsters are severely threatening public health.”

The city doesn’t contract directly with Republic — that falls to the individual businesses that use the company’s services.

But city health and safety code enforcement personnel have also reported interactions with businesses throughout the city that are struggling to “[pay] for trash pickup service under contracts with Republic Services that they are not receiving,” Wu noted.

At the same time, those businesses are being “assessed fines for trash violations on a daily basis that are making already tight margins unsustainable,” the Democratic mayor continued.

Union workers, represented by Teamsters Local 25, walked off the job on July 1, demanding better pay and benefits.

Republic sued the union, charging that it’s engaged in worker intimidation, which labor leaders have denied.

On Monday, a federal judge shot down the company’s request for a court order to stop the alleged activity, The Boston Globe reported.

The overall case is still pending, the newspaper reported.

Meanwhile, uncollected trash has accumulated in dumpsters in Boston and other Massachusetts communities where the company operates.

City officials did not impose fines for the first week of the strike, from July 1 to July 6. But they have been imposing them “continuously” since July 7.

Wu said the city expects Republic to foot the bill for the fines that have been imposed since July 7.

“Private trash collection serves a critical role in maintaining clean streets, public health, and a livable city, and we expect Republic to fulfill its obligations to customers immediately,” Wu wrote.