Leaf Collection Update - 12/21/2007

From Paxtang

As you may have expected, the weather has taken it's toll on our schedule and operations for most of the fall. While our staff was out every day possible, its seems as if it took forever for leaves to fall. When they finally did, it was all at once. And if that wasn't bad enough, the wintry mix that fell last week and coated our trees with a seasonal sheen, also brought down numerous branches. Many fell into the roads and streets and had to be removed as a priority for safety. Some residents unintentionally added to the confusion be placing fallen branches on top of their leaf piles. We discovered that this hampers us considerably because the leaf machine cannot pick up any branches. All branches are going to have to be removed by hand prior to any more leaf collection.

We are now well behind with the collection of leaves. Rest assured that the Borough will continue to pick up leaves as the holiday work schedule permits and into the New Year until either all the leaves are up, or until snows forces us to switch to plowing the streets.

Some of you have inquired as to whether the Borough would pick up branches from trees that are not shade trees, but are clearly trees from back and side yards. While we would like to help everyone, we simply do not have the resources to do so. Some of you have pulled limbs and branches to the curb, many of which are 8 to 10 inches in diameter and larger, with the expectation that the Borough staff will cut up and dispose of these. At this time Paxtang Borough simply cannot accommodate these requests. To cut these into manageable lengths and dispose of them would take us from borough-wide efforts that benefit all. The collection of evergreen branches would fall into this category.

We ask for your patience through what is expected to be a long a tedious process. Please bear with us.