A scathing report has detailed the horrific working conditions of Baltimore city employees, with some having to ask for toilet paper under the facility’s policy.
Baltimore City Inspector General Isabel Cumming discovered earlier this month that Department of Public Works employees at the Cherry Hill Reedbird Yard had been working in the extreme heat without the city providing them with cold water or proper cooling facilities, CBS News reports.
She has since visited eight other facilities – and returned to the Reedbird Yard – where mostly solid waste workers report to, and found even more problems that she details in a 46-page report.
At the Bowley’s Lane facility, Cumming noted that employees have to ask for toilet paper before using the bathroom because men’s stalls are not stocked with the essential item.
‘There was no toilet paper, and it wasn’t like it was just missing – that is the way they operate,’ she told CBS News.
Baltimore Inspector General Isabel Cumming released a scathing report detailing the deplorable conditions at Department of Public Works facilities on Tuesday
She visited the Bowley Lane facility and noticed a number of issues
Cumming explained in her report that ‘the toilet paper is stored in a storeroom with a supply employee,’ a practice she implored the Department of Public Works to ‘stop immediately.’
She wrote that toilet paper should instead be placed in the stalls for all of the solid waste workers and laborers.
The report also notes that some Department of Public Works experienced heat-related illnesses – with at least one passing out.
At the Bowley Lane facility, Cumming said ‘they have hot water running’ in the locker rooms.
‘They had a fan barely blowing, and they had an air conditioner that was only doing 84 degrees as well,’ she told CBS.
Some department vehicles also lacked working air conditioners.
Cumming is now requesting ‘all records of heat-related illness training’ the DPW provides to its employees over the past three years.
At the facility, employees have to ask for toilet paper before using the bathroom
The toilet paper is stored in a separate storeroom and not in the stalls, the report notes
Additionally, Cumming noticed a bunch of equipment that could help improve working conditions for the DPW employees sitting around and not being used.
‘The OIG observed approximately 20 unopened boxes of ice chests and dozens of unopened insulated water dispensers,’ the report said
‘A supervisor stated that the insulated water dispensers did not fit on the newer garbage trucks and that some employees did not want them.’
Some of the equipment was even stored in facility showers.
At the Bowley Lane facility, the temperatures were reading 85 degrees Fahrenheit
Some of the problems were reported at the Cherry Hill facility – the same one that Cumming had cited earlier this month.
‘They were aware,’ she said of the Department of Public Works supervisors. These conditions are not changing. We need to make this better.’
The Department of Public Works previously told CBS Baltimore that upgrades were coming, but Cumming said the changes need to go into effect immediately.
‘Telling me that something will be done in three years is not good enough, because in three years, we might not have the money for any of that,’ she said.
‘We need to fix these basic human needs now.’
Cumming also said that employees were left in the heat without cold water to drink
She added that she brought the city’s Chief Administrative Officer Faith Leach to two of the facilities on Tuesday morning to show her some of the deplorable conditions, but noted there were some slight improvements.
Still, Cumming said the DPW has not seen the last of her.
‘Oh, I’ll definitely be going, but I’m not telling you or anyone else when I’m coming,’ she told WMAR.
DailyMail.com has reached out to the Department of Public Works for comment.