Objective

To determine whether the New York City Department of Sanitation (DSNY) effectively monitors the cleanliness of New York City’s (NYC) streets and sidewalks. We also assessed the methodology used by the Mayor’s Office of Operations to rate street and sidewalk cleanliness. Our audit covered the period January 1, 2015 to September 27, 2019.

About the Program

DSNY’s mission is to keep NYC healthy, safe, and clean – by collecting, recycling, and disposing of waste; cleaning streets and vacant lots; and clearing snow and ice. DSNY has access to several data sources that monitor the cleanliness of NYC’s streets and sidewalks. This includes NYC311 sanitation service request data and certain other DSNY daily records, such as Mechanical Broom Daily Performance logs as well as Scorecard Ratings (or Project Scorecard) created by the NYC Mayor’s Office of Operations (Operations). Together, these data sources are available to DSNY officials for identifying ongoing problem areas as well as evaluating the effectiveness of its sanitation operations. However, DSNY uses Project Scorecard as its only performance measure for monitoring the cleanliness of NYC’s streets and sidewalks.

Key Findings

DSNY needs to improve its communication, coordination, and record keeping processes to efficiently and effectively address persistent cleanliness problems on NYC streets and sidewalks. Based on our site visits to a sample of 271 NYC blockfaces (one side of a city block, corner to corner, including the street and its sidewalk) with multiple NYC311 complaints, we determined 189 streets and 159 sidewalks were dirty based on Operations’ Scorecard Ratings criteria. DSNY officials did not analyze readily available data such as NYC311 service requests or even its own monitoring records to identify problem areas or trends.

• DSNY did not effectively utilize or share relevant information across its bureaus and divisions. For example, although DSNY’s Enforcement Division created an Area of Concern watch list based on its monitoring efforts, this information was not shared with other relevant departments for data analysis or cleaning route-planning purposes.
• DSNY does not monitor the daily performance of its street cleaning staff nor do supervisors monitor the cleanliness of NYC streets and sidewalks. For example, DSNY officials did not show they used available information (NYC311 and internal records) to plan the supervision of their cleaning and enforcement operations. DSNY officials maintain their staff know the problem areas in their districts and can plan the best use of DSNY’s resources.
• Although DSNY officials identified Project Scorecard as their only performance measure for monitoring the cleanliness of NYC’s streets and sidewalks, DSNY does not obtain detailed information from Project Scorecard or the Mayor’s Office to effectively deploy its resources in response to Project Scorecard’s findings.
• While the Scorecard may provide policy makers at Operations and DSNY with useful information, it does not provide DSNY with actionable cleanliness information, as the specific location of any dirty conditions is not reported. The methodology Operations uses to select streets and sidewalks for Scorecard Ratings inspections not only dates back to 1973 but also is not documented. As such, there is no assurance that the blockfaces sampled for inspection are statistically representative of NYC and its various sections.
• The inspections are performed from a moving car, making it difficult for the inspectors to have an unobstructed view of the street/sidewalk being rated.

Key Recommendations

To DSNY:

• Use all available data sources, such as NYC311 service requests, violation summons data, and internal DSNY monitoring forms, to routinely identify specific areas with recurring dirty streets and sidewalks.
• Identify the root causes for recurring dirty areas and develop solutions to address them, including seeking community, department, or cross-agency engagements, where necessary.
• Develop and implement additional performance measures for identifying targeted needs of NYC’s streets and sidewalks.

To Operations:

• Ensure that the appropriate criteria are applied when calculating Scorecard Ratings.
• Explore the value of performing inspections from the street or using other methodologies that provide an unobstructed view of the blockfaces being rated.
• Re-establish the sampling methodology to ensure that sampled blockfaces are representative of current-day NYC streets and sidewalks.