CLEVELAND — On Thursday, Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb ended an interview with News 5 Investigator Tara Morgan when he was pressed about canceling the leaf pickup program and told how it upset residents.
The interview came just a day after the City of Cleveland announced the curbside leaf pickup program that was set to start on Nov. 8 was canceled before it even started.
RELATED: City of Cleveland walks back curbside leaf pickup program, cancels it altogether
Morgan was interviewing Bibb about the new Community Police Commission and was given a brief window to ask questions about the commission and to keep it on topic, but following community outrage regarding the city's leaf pickup announcement, she felt it pertinent to ask questions regarding the collection policy change.
Residents across the city have already expressed anger over the city's decision. Across numerous neighborhoods, residents raked their leaves into piles on their tree lawns, expecting the city to start pickup up the leaves next week.
But Tuesday afternoon, the Bibb administration said residents are now required to bag their leaves and set those out for collection instead of having the piles picked up by a city truck and workers.
The change was done to make leaf collection "more fair and equitable to all residents who pay taxes," the city said. The change will also include the removal of the 20-bag limit for all households. Homeowners will now be able to have an unlimited number of leaf bags placed in front of their homes for their weekly garbage pick-up.
Bibb expanded on that in his interview Thursday morning with News 5, stating that only a third of the residents in the city were going to get leaf pickup curbside.
"We are doing everything we can to improve and enhance the service quality of basic city services in our city. And after consultation with leadership and Public Works and my COO, we wanted to make sure that we had the right manpower and capacity to prepare for our winter season," Bibb said.
The city is facing "challenges right now in terms of hiring capacity," along with every sector of the economy, Bibb said.
Bibb said he wants to make sure that all city services are equal across all parts of the city, so apparently, with only a third of residents living in areas where the leaf pickup was available, it was canceled for everyone.
The city did not address the concerns people are expressing about the change in service. When News 5 told the mayor we had been inundated with calls from angry residents about the matter, Bibb ended the interview.
"Thanks. Appreciate it," he said.
The city said the mayor had a limited amount of time as he had a busy rest of the day.
Watch the unedited segment of Morgan's interview with Bibb about leaf collection below:
Upset residents also reached out to their Cleveland City Council ward representatives about the issue.
Ward 2 Councilman Kevin Bishop explained that residents voted in 2016 for Issue 32 which increased income taxes to pay for expanded services such as the now-canceled leaf pickup program.
He plans to have a hearing next week to address the issue with the city.
You can watch more about what residents had to say about the cancelation of the leaf pickup program in the player below:
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