New York City Hall has hired a former teacher to put a stop to one of the metropolis’ greatest and oldest enemies, the rats.
All the mayors of New York have fought this war and most have lost.
Now Eric Adams has bet on a former teacher and anti-race activist, designating her as responsible for reducing rodents, the Associated Press (AP) news agency reported.
Kathleen Corradi is tasked with fighting the potentially millions of rats found in urban nooks and crannies, subway tunnels and vacant lots.
According to the mayor, the new head of Rodent Mitigation has “the knowledge, motivation, experience and energy to eradicate rats and create a cleaner and more welcoming city for all New Yorkers.”
“The mice will hate Kathy, but we’re thrilled to have her at the helm of this important effort,” added Eric Adams.
The city promoted this job with an ad seeking “bloodthirsty” candidates who possessed “murderous instincts” and could undertake the “massive slaughter” of rats.
“When I first saw the ad I wasn’t sure if it was real. ‘Bloodlust’ isn’t a word you’d normally see in a job description and it’s certainly not one I’m used to [utilizar para] describe me,” Corradi explained at a press conference in Harlem Park.
“You’ll see a lot of me and a lot less rats,” he assured.
Rats have long plagued the city and are one of the major concerns of the population, along with crime, housing shortages and high rents.
No trap or poison could completely reduce their numbers, and the rats thrived in subway tunnels and burrows in vacant lots and city parks.
“Rats are smart, they’re resilient. Many of us live in communities where rats think they run the city,” said Eric Adams, a Democrat.
Last year, New Yorkers called the rat sighting hotline nearly 3.2 million times, just ahead of the peak for complaints in 2021.
New York City’s approach stands in stark contrast to some efforts by animal rights advocates in Paris, where some estimates suggest there may be more rats than the 2.2 million people, perhaps twice as many.
The recent garbage collection strike has left some streets infested with rats.
Animal rights organization Paris Animaux Zoopolis is trying to convince Parisians that “rats are not the enemy!”
In New York, Adams thinks differently. “We cannot be philosophical about issues that affect the quality of life of New Yorkers,” the mayor stressed.
In November, the city’s mayor signed into law a law to reduce the city’s rat problem, including new rules that limit how long trash can sit on the street.
Corradi’s first mission will be to launch a “rat containment zone” in Harlem, where the city will invest $3.5 million (about €3.2 million) to implement “an accelerated rat reduction plan.”
Strategies that work in the Harlem park will be expanded to other locations.
In addition to the usual fear and disgust they cause, rats can transmit diseases such as leptospirosis. In rare cases, the disease can lead to meningitis and cause kidney and liver failure.
Source: DN
