New York Environment: Trash a major issue in Big Apple

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03:07

New York is one of the world's major cities and attracts people from around the globe. But it's been called the dirtiest city as trash has become a major issue. Our reporter John Terrett take a closer look.

How does that line go in the famous Frank Sinatra song "New York, New York"? "I want to wake-up in a city that doesn't SWEEP?"

JOHN TERRETT, NEW YORK "Look at this stuff, it's always like this. It never seems to get cleaned up and this is 48th Street in the heart of Midtown Manhattan. Rockefeller Plaza, where the ice skating happens at Christmas time, is just over there."

And trash is a major issue on New York's mass transit system too, and where there's trash there's vermin. But dirt in New York is not just about eyesores where the tourists go. It's about the impact on low income communities where the people who keep this city running actually live.

BRENDA WHITE, BRONX RESIDENT "Bottles, pampers, mice on traps that are still alive, whatever, you name it, comes out the window."

Brenda says her apartment's infested with Water Bugs too, she hates creepy crawlies! Community Voices Heard is a non-profit in Harlem that helps low income families with housing issues.

AFUA ATTA-MENSAH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, COMMUNITY VOICES HEARD "Clearly we're biased but New York City is one of the greatest cities in the world, clearly this is a great state!"

But Afua Atta-Mensah says almost half a million people live in New York public housing and many apartments are not fit to live in.

AFUA ATTA-MENSAH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, COMMUNITY VOICES HEARD "You have many buildings that are frankly deteriorating and deteriorating at a rapid rate."

The Governor of New York State recently toured some of New York's public housing in the Bronx and declared it the worst he'd ever seen.

ANDREW CUOMO, GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK "It's like a bad Charles Dickens novel. You have the heat still going on and off. You have children living with asthma in units with mold."

The New York City public housing authority, NYCHA, is the largest of its kind in North America. Afua Atta-Mensah says systemic under-funding by Federal, State and even local government over forty years means the rot has set in.

AFUA ATTA-MENSAH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, COMMUNITY VOICES HEARD "Mold is a serious problem in a lot of NYCHA developments."

HATTIE ELLISON, BRONX RESIDENT "I just get where I can hardly breathe and I can like feel something in my throat, the doctor told me I had allergy."

Back on the ground floor Brenda walks with a cane. She put her back out when she fell in this flooded corridor outside her apartment.

AFUA ATTA-MENSAH, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, COMMUNITY VOICES HEARD "It's a large number of folks who are living in horrible conditions through no fault of their own other than the government has decided to disinvest."

People come from all over the world to New York, those who visit see the iconic sights mostly don't notice the trash on the ground, nor the housing conditions in which many who serve them live.

JOHN TERRETT, NEW YORK "but once you scratch below the surface just a little bit maybe the title 'America's dirtiest city' is justified after all and that the Big Apple has a core that's ripe for a clean-up. JT, CGTN, New York."