Council Member Simcha Felder is renewing his call for a pause in enforcement of the City's mandatory NYC Bin program, now that DSNY has begun issuing tickets, as the required but unavailable containers turn up on the resale market at inflated prices and residents report bins being stolen off their property.

In a new letter to Sanitation Commissioner Gregory Anderson, Felder asked DSNY to suspend enforcement and dismiss, or treat as warnings, any summonses issued since full enforcement began on September 8, until the City can guarantee that supply actually meets the demand its own mandate created. Felder first raised the issue in a letter in May to Mayor Zohran Mamdani, warning that New Yorkers were struggling to obtain the bins in good faith. In response, DSNY delayed enforcement through September 8th, yet despite supply issues being unresolved, enforcement is now underway.

"We warned the City that you cannot mandate a product without making sure people can actually get it," Felder said. "Now mandated bins are turning up for resale at inflated prices, residents are reporting stolen bins, and the City is fining people who don't have one. That is not fair enforcement."

Felder points to DSNY's decision to make Home Depot the sole authorized retailer for the NYC Bin as a root cause of the shortage. Restricting sales to a single retailer, he argues, has left demand badly outpacing supply and pushed desperate homeowners toward a resale market where bins are marked up well above retail. Adding to the difficulty of obtaining bins is Home Depot’s locations being inaccessible to many New Yorkers, unlike local community stores.

"One retailer cannot carry the weight of an entire city's compliance," Felder said. "If the City is going to mandate a specific container, it should not also restrict who's allowed to sell it. Opening this up to more stores is basic common sense."

Theft adds a second layer to the problem: homeowners who bought the required bin and complied with the mandate are having it stolen off their property, then facing a ticket for not having one.

"Imagine doing exactly what the City told you to do, buying the bin, putting it out for collection, and then having it stolen," Felder said. "Now you have to buy another one but none are available and you may already have a ticket waiting for you. Government should be solving that problem, not adding another penalty on top of it."

Felder is calling on DSNY to pause enforcement and dismiss existing tickets until supply is reliable, end the single-retailer restriction, and review inventory and distribution citywide. He stressed the request is not an objection to cleaner streets.

"Cleaner streets are something all New Yorkers can support," Felder said. "But good policy requires good implementation. The goal should be compliance, not punishment. Until supply catches up and more than one store is allowed to sell these bins, the fines should stop, and the tickets already issued should be dismissed."