News

May 25, 2023

Here's why discarded shopping carts are becoming 'an issue' for Pueblo

More than a few Pueblo big-box retailers have seen their share of shopping carts

More than a few Pueblo big-box retailers have seen their share of shopping carts removed from their premises over the past year. It isn't hard to spot the abandoned carts in various places scattered around the city.

Since the start of the year, there have been hundreds of shopping carts taken from Pueblo retailers. Those carts are often left in peculiar places and piled up, creating what some feel is an eyesore. The carts also may create hazards if taken and placed near intersections or sidewalks.

Members of the city's neighborhood cleanup program, Team Up to Clean Up, have collected 790 stray shopping carts so far this year. The program collected 182 carts from Jan. 24 to March 23 and more than three-times that amount from March 23 to June 5.

Pueblo Police Department's Code Enforcement Unit picked up 183 carts this year as of June 5.

Most of the stray carts collected were returned to retailers, said Haley Sue Robinson, director of public affairs for the city. Code Enforcement has around 80 carts that are awaiting pickup, she said.

Other cities around the U.S. in recent months have approved ordinances that require businesses to place an anti-theft device on their shopping carts or retrieve them through their own means or a third-party contractor.

Some municipalities introduced ordinances that impose fines if businesses don't comply with that type of regulation or ban pushing them on a sidewalk.

Pueblo City Council during a meeting in March at least entertained the notion, tossing around ideas such as instituting a fine if businesses don't contain their carts or use an anti-theft device.

Heather Graham, city council president and mayoral candidate, said at that time she felt such regulations could save retailers money and save the city the time it uses to round up the carts.

In an interview with the Chieftain, Graham said stray shopping carts pose a hazard for pedestrians and make some areas of Pueblo unsightly. She said she recently received several calls from people asking about numerous upside-down carts at the 29th Street Pump Station with random items strewn throughout them.

"It makes us look like a community that's OK with that going on and allows it," Graham said. "It can be dangerous if one of the shopping carts rolls off in a busy shopping center."

Wrangling stray carts is part of the Team Up to Clean Up crew's efforts, but it's time-consuming and at times keeps them from picking up trash in other areas, said Barbara Alphin, trash removal coordinator for the program.

The team usually puts the stray carts aside at a neutral location after collecting them so they can focus on places where trash has excessively accumulated.

"On days where we find 20 or 30 of them, I have to keep running back and forth," Alphin said. "That takes two of us off the crew to do that. That's our man-hours there."

Some retailers in Pueblo, including Walmart, have been open to attempts to recover their carts. A Walmart spokesperson in a statement to the Chieftain said the company is "happy to work with the city to recover our property as quickly as possible. We use several methods to recover stolen shopping carts when notified, including third-party contractors."

The Chieftain also reached out to spokespeople for King Soopers and Target but they did not respond to requests for comment.

Stray carts are especially noticeable on the North Side, said Paul Montoya, a Pueblo advocate for people experiencing homelessness. Some among that population are known to take shopping carts from big-box stores and do so because they have no other way to carry all their belongings, he said.

In cities that have taken a stricter approach to shopping cart theft, at the forefront of the discussion has been whether such an ordinance targets the homeless.

Some stakeholders in those cities have said it's important to find a balance between not allowing carts to be aimlessly discarded throughout town and holding the people who take them accountable, but without overly severe punishments.

Graham said she believes a fine for pushing a cart on the sidewalk would be ineffective, as people experiencing homelessness would likely be unable to pay it off. Instead, the city should work to help those individuals find a place, such as lockers, where they can stash their personal items, she said.

She also thinks implementing a city ordinance would require some type of enforcement from retailers to prevent carts from being taken.

"How we start to minimize the shopping carts that are out and about, I think that's something that council will definitely take a look at," Graham said. "(Stray carts) are in all four districts all over town. It's becoming an issue for Pueblo."

Graham said it's possible city council will seek to find a solution to its abandoned shopping cart problem in the next year, as it ties into the homelessness crisis the city and local organizations are trying to address.

Chieftain reporter Josue Perez can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @josuepwrites.