It’s Ground Hog’s Day: The Abandoned Televisions on My Street Saw Their Shadow

• by Ken Jackson
• February 3, 2018

Like Punxsutawney Phil, I have a Ground Hogs Day scenario. Just as in the movie Ground Hog’s Day when Bill Murry’s character, a reporter, wakes up and it is Ground Hog’s Day every day. On trash pickup day on my street, it’s like living in the movie, Ground Hog’s Day. How many times have I separated and placed items in blue bin only to discover that the D.P.W. collected the trash, but neglected to retrieve the recyclables? It’s like Ground Hog’s Day, it happens repeatedly. Then call the requisite numbers and send emails and texts to elected officials and if I’m lucky, the recycling is picked up, only to have the same thing happen two weeks later. In fact, this has become such a regular occurrence; I hesitate to separate the items. Why cooperate with recycling efforts, if an area is routinely missed? You might think I’m describing some “minority” populated area, in the so-called worst part of Syracuse.  My neighborhood lights up the poverty map, like Lights on the Lake. And “How poor is my neighborhood?” My Neighborhood is so poor, that Onondaga County sent representatives with cleaning supplies to distribute, “Formula 409 and a bucket anyone?” My neighborhood is so poor, that some resident homeowners use paneling and duct tape to hold their homes together. My Neighborhood is so poor, that one neighbor ran his sewage pipe into the ground until his driveway swell. My neighborhood is so poor that the average income is $12 per hour. My neighborhood is white. The Tipperary Hill line is only one short city block away, but it can be a global distance in the way these areas are maintained and regarded. Irish laborers settled the area after building the Erie Canal, they settled on the Far Westside of Syracuse. Peter Coleman’s new house is only two blocks away. I’ve come to learn after living 10 years on a tiny street, that the quality of life in Syracuse is like living in a movie, such as, Ground Hog’s Day. If I dare look out my front window, there’s a plethora of unregistered vehicles, a feral cat farm and a retirement village for abandoned plastic items. The property across the street is capped by a carpet jutting out of the open attic window. The burnt out occupied house at the corner is celebrating another birthday. With each receding snow pack, the 2 televisions that have spent their winter hibernating on the corner re-appear like little reminders, that every day is the same. The DPW crews pass them by, as if these items didn’t exist. Things have deteriorated to the point where people just leave their trash in front of their homes in plain view. Why bother observing the set-out rules regarding trash collection, if the city doesn’t do their part? It only accelerates the deterioration of a home, then a block, and finally as in so many cases in Syracuse, an entire neighborhood. I’ve written this same column, 10 years from the same location, over and over, and over again, since Mayor Driscoll, Mayor Miner, and now Mayor Walsh. Yep, its Ground Hog’s Day, 6 more weeks of wondering if the recycling truck is going to appear, signaling signs of an early Spring.