This story was orginally published by City Desk ABQ.
Those who have encountered human feces on the streets of Albuquerque would say it’s unsightly and offensive to the nostrils of residents and visitors.
But the effect of these deposits goes beyond the aesthetic, according to city leaders and health experts.
City Councilor Tammy Fiebelkorn recently introduced legislation that would establish a $100,000 fund to pay for proper removal of human waste. Citizens would report seeing feces by calling 311, and a private company versed in handling biohazards would be dispatched to clear the site.
Currently, cleaning up outdoor human waste in Albuquerque is the responsibility of the property owner. Fiebelkorn’s bill would have the city taking the lead on that, whether feces is found on public or private property.
She said that the legislation came about after she received reports from constituents who were having to clean up feces in their alleys — some of the residents provided photos. Fiebelkorn said that she initially had assumed that such cleanups were a city responsibility, but discovered otherwise while doing research.
“We can’t have individual people handling human feces,” she said. “It’s a risk to themselves and a risk to our water supply.”
Fiebelkorn said she talked to the city’s Environmental Health Department and learned of businesses with proper qualifications for disposing of biohazards. She said that staff in the Albuquerque Solid Waste Management Department also aren’t trained for that type of cleanup.
“I want to make sure people do it correctly,” Fiebelkorn said. “You don’t want people to wash it into storm drains.”
Councilor Nichole Rogers is co-sponsoring the legislation. She said her involvement is a direct response to concerns her constituents have raised.
Rogers said that her background in health care makes her aware of the potential for spreading various illnesses that unattended human waste represents.
“This is a no-brainer for me,” she said.
Rogers tied open defecation to the lack of available public restrooms for the city’s homeless.
“Should they be doing that?” she asked rhetorically. “No, but the fact is, there are not enough places for people to do it.”
She said she’ll be working on getting new restrooms for District 6.
Fiebelkorn said that the cleanup program is a short-term solution, and that going forward, the city needs to provide more public restrooms. She said the Old Town Loo, in the Uptown Transit Center is the only 24/7 restroom in Albuquerque — extremely inadequate for the city’s homeless population, which she estimates at $4,000.
Fiebelkorn said more public restrooms would also benefit transit users, tourists and residents out running errands.
A report in BMC Public Health states that after restrooms were installed in San Francisco, reports of exposed feces declined by more than 12 per week.
Fiebelkorn said that increasing the city’s affordable housing stock will lead to fewer people living on the streets and a reduction in public defecation.
A report in Environmental Justice states that people experiencing homelessness defecate in public for a variety of reasons. Those include lack of public resources, perceptions about public toilets, feelings of being unwelcome at service centers, concerns about safety, and physical and mental illness, including addiction.”
Authors Elizabeth Frye, Drew Capone, and Dabney Evans state that additional public toilets are necessary and would reduce open defecation, but also urge policies that help get the homeless into permanent supportive housing.
A team from the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health collected discarded feces from streets and sidewalks in San Francisco and confirmed that 20% of the samples gathered were of human origin.
The researchers discovered pathogens in more than half of the samples they tested, according to a news release the school, affiliated with the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, issued in September. Those included Cryptosporidium, Giardia, Shigella, pathogenic E. coli, norovirus and others.
“San Francisco deserves credit for addressing this issue head-on,” associate professor Joe Brown, who led the research team, said in the release. “Open defecation is not just a nuisance; it can bring public health risks too, with the majority of risks borne by unhoused people. We need cities to take action to meet people where they are.”
Fiebelkorn’s bill will go through the Finance and Government Operations Committee, then to the full City Council, which would vote on sending the matter to Mayor Tim Keller. She said she’s confident in its chances for adoption.
“I can’t imagine a rational reason to oppose this,” Fiebelkorn said. “(Residents) shouldn’t have to clean up human feces just because they live next to an alley.”
Read more.
Read the full bill and contact your legislator to add your comments before action on the bill.