By J.B. Fitzsimmons | Gloucester Correspondent
GLOUCESTER — With garbage collection delayed, canceled, or up in the air — depending on the hour — throughout Cape Ann due to the recent sanitation workers’ strike, the City of Gloucester has announced a groundbreaking new initiative: transitioning the local economy to a fully trash-based system.
“Look, we’ve got more garbage than dollar bills at this point,” said Gloucester’s chief garbage officer Jeff Weatherbee, standing atop a slowly collapsing pile of purple trash bags outside City Hall. “So instead of trying to get rid of it, we’re embracing the trash as the future of commerce, culture, and identity. It’s Gloucester’s Bitcoin.”
Under the new municipal plan — tentatively titled “Zero Waste, Infinite Value” — residents are encouraged to use household garbage as currency. Suggested exchange rates include:
- 1 pizza box (grease-saturated) = 2 fried clams
- 3 empty tallboys = a raffle ticket for priority beach parking
- 1 week’s worth of compostable coffee filters = 1 beer at participating bars (limit one per day per stinker)
- Any bag that “crunches when you kick it” = entry into the new Trash Lottery (top prize: an official city rake and a pair of gloves with one missing finger)
City officials say the system is based on “trust, smell, and good old Yankee improvisation.”
Residents have responded with what can only be described as enthusiastic despair. One East Gloucester couple opened a boutique storefront called Le Garbage, selling upcycled “trash bundles” wrapped in twine and irony. Their most popular item, “Tuesday Morning with Baby Wipes,” retails for $36 and smells like old shrimp salad and heartbreak.
“I’m not even mad,” said Hartz Street resident Marcy Giambro. “I traded a bin of wet cardboard for a breakfast sandwich and a ride to Market Basket. That’s just Gloucester hospitality.”
Local artists have also taken to the streets. A Rocky Neck sculptor known only as Flotsam has constructed a ten-foot rendering of St. Peter out of broken laundry baskets and old fireworks. It now stands in front of City Hall with a seagull’s nest for a crown and a handwritten sign that reads: “Forgive Us Our Wrappers.”
Republic Services, the waste collection company whose workers walked off the job, has resumed partial service — but only for neighborhoods deemed “spiritually tidy” by their own metrics. As a result, homes on the mainland stretch of Western Avenue have seen pickup resume, while neighborhoods near Burnham’s Field have entered the first stages of what Republic has termed “ambient composting.”
Tensions have begun to rise.
“We’re trying to stay positive,” said Poplar Street resident Brendan D’Amico, who has converted his porch into a “trash wall” to keep raccoons and his in-laws away. “But I caught my neighbor siphoning Febreze from my recycling bin and I’m starting to wonder if this is how Mad Max begins.”
To address growing concerns about public health, the Gloucester Board of Health has issued a list of helpful tips for surviving the “new normal,” including:
- Wear a mask if you can’t tell whether a bag is organic or just mysterious
- If it squishes, don’t investigate
- Try to remember that “your neighbor is not your enemy, even if their trash pile smells like revenge”
- All fires must be approved and “ceremonial in nature”
Public health officials are also warning about “airborne funk,” an emerging condition caused by prolonged exposure to sunbaked recyclables and old shrimp tails. The city has responded by issuing free clothespins and suggesting residents “just pretend it’s low tide.”
Still, some residents are optimistic.
“This is bringing us together in ways I never imagined,” said Friend Street resident Martha McCourtney, who recently traded a bag of moldy bread and expired cheese for a handmade ukulele. “It’s like bartering, but with more raccoons and less dignity.”
The mayor’s office has announced the formation of a Trash-Based Economic Council consisting of two poets, one retired sanitation worker, a child who collects bottle caps “for art,” and a seagull that has been informally adopted by the City Council. Their first meeting was reportedly productive, though briefly interrupted by a coyote falling asleep in a bin of expired hummus.
“We may not have garbage pickup,” said Weatherbee, delicately stepping over a leaking Glad bag, “but we’ve got grit, gumption, and a disturbing amount of used vapes. Gloucester always finds a way.”
The Dogtown Reader 