The Baltimore City Council excoriated Department of Public Works officials Thursday night, calling out agency leadership over a long list of shortcomings and failures that are under renewed scrutiny following a sanitation worker’s on-the-job death earlier this month.
From long-running culture problems to the the poor facilities and working conditions employees face, it was open season on DPW management, and the agency heads knew it.
“Employees deserve better conditions,” Department of Public Works Acting Director Khalil Zaied said during the council hearing, one of many times he and his deputies acknowledge the department’s failures.
Ronald Silver II died on Aug. 2 of heat exhaustion during his shift as a garbage collector on a day when the heat index reached 105 degrees.
Silver’s death was the nadir for a beleaguered department which had been under fire for weeks for its workplace. Baltimore Inspector General Isabel Mercedes Cumming issued two scathing reports about the poor working conditions at DPW earlier this summer.
One of Cumming’s reports included details about the Cherry Hill yard where Silver was based. On a particularly hot morning in July, Cumming states she personally observed employees at Cherry Hill leaving for their trash routes without being given water or Gatorade for their shifts.
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The reports found broken air conditioning, inoperable water fountains and nonfunctional ice machines at one facility and damaged locker rooms and locked-up toilet paper at another — employees had to ask a supervisor for hygiene products in order to use the bathroom, something Councilman Zeke Cohen called “cruel,” “inhumane” and “bizarre.”
At one location, according to the inspector general’s reports, water and Gatorade were kept under lock and key, even as temperatures soared. Councilwoman Odette Ramos called that “bananas.”
DPW employees who testified did not spare their director, either. Clarence Thomas, an AFSCME 3 union stewards and employee at the Cherry Hill facility, said workers are paid less than McDonald’s employees, contributing to bad morale.
Michael Stanley, an AFSCME 3 union stewards and employee who picks up trash around the harbor, said supervisors have a “bullying approach” toward their subordinates.
“If you don’t do things, they find a way to punish you,” Stanley said.
Zaied acknowledged concerns about the department’s culture and said he will work to change it. However, he repeatedly struggled to fully address council’s questions, regularly enduring animated and tense lines of inquiries.
Ramos, for example, questioned how Zaied could not have noticed the poor conditions at sanitation facilities on his various site visits.
Zaied, who rejoined the city in March and has 20 years experience in Baltimore, said many of the issues only came to his attention “just recently.”
Silver’s family spoke at a news conference earlier Thursday and at the hearing, both times demanding answers about how the department’s working conditions could have contributed to his death.
“To put it plainly, our family needs answers and we need them now,” Renee Meredith, an aunt of Silver, said before the city council hearing Thursday.
The circumstances of Silver’s death are under investigation by the Maryland Occupational Safety and Health agency; Gov. Wes Moore has called for a full inquiry.
Council also lobbed criticisms at Mayor Brandon Scott’s office for hiring a law firm with an extensive history of defending employers accused of workplace safety violations as part of the administration’s response to Silver’s death.
”This is a firm that represents companies largely trying to push back on OSHA and, from what I can read, weaken heat standards,” said Cohen, who is expected to win the general election for City Council President in November.
Scott’s office contracted with Conn Maciel Carey last week to offer a set of recommendations regarding safety policies, practices and procedures at public works department. Union leaders and former safety officials earlier this week questioned the city’s decision to pick the firm, which represents a multi-industry trade group seeking to weaken a proposed heat safety rule from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
Councilman Antonio Glover, a former Department of Public Works employee, demanded to know why the city would hire a firm with an anti-labor record to do a review of the department when city employees have been crying foul for years.
“We know what we need. We’re telling you what we need. We just need you to address these issues,” Glover said. He recalled poor working conditions from his own tenure at DPW and said the culture of bullying that permeated the agency during his time still exists today.
Conn Maciel Carey’s recommendations are expected sometime in September and Scott’s office committed to sharing their report with the public.
In the interim, Zaied said the department will schedule more training for employees, including additional sessions for spotting and preventing heat-related illness.
In a presentation to city councilmembers Thursday night, Department of Public Works officials said the agency had completed 14 training sessions for 517 employees so far in 2024, all of them since June 20 — the same day the Baltimore Office of the Inspector General first reached out to the agency to inquire about safety issues.
