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New York City hiring top rat killer
- corndoge 4y ago"Do you have what it takes? A virulent vehemence for vermin?" Vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition? I'm choosing to believe this is a v for vendetta reference
- anshumankmr 4y agoI would vote for Larry, the Chief Mouser of UK.
- dennis_jeeves1 4y agoTeach rats C++.
- animitronix 4y agoOne word: terriers
- yehudalouis 4y agoAny good ideas on how you'd implement a rat extermination strategy?
- skizm 4y agoRelease a bunch of snakes?
- djmips 4y agoThat always goes well.
- teeray 4y agoAfter retiring from the FBI, Neville Flynn (Samuel L. Jackson) takes a job as a motorman on an NYC subway. Meanwhile, the city hires the top rat exterminator in the country (Christopher Walken) who uses the unconventional technique of releasing thousands of vipers into the city’s sewers. Coming this summer… Snakes on a Train
- insane_dreamer 4y agoGood job security thinking. You can claim success and then get re-hired for a job posting to "exterminate an infestation of snakes in the city"
- aliqot 4y agothis guy https://www.youtube.com/@ShawnWoodsprimitive-archer https://www.youtube.com/@ShawnWoodsprimitive-archer
- FinalDestiny 4y agoWe call Charlie Kelly
- ogoparootbbo 4y agoonly caveat is the troll's toll
- reducesuffering 4y agoKing of the Rats: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2MvHuflizQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2MvHuflizQ
- 4y ago
- Cupertino95014 4y agoIf only rats had a natural enemy: https://tenor.com/view/killer-upset-kitty-gun-meme-gif-8657367 https://tenor.com/view/killer-upset-kitty-gun-meme-gif-86573...
- superchroma 4y agoIf only there was a natural enemy of rats that didn't spread toxoplasmosis and cat scratch fever.
- Cupertino95014 4y agohttps://www.legalnomads.com/istanbul-cats/ https://www.legalnomads.com/istanbul-cats/ "In addition, the documentary looks into the history of cat domestication, and how in the middle ages the church tried to get rid of cats due to their association with witches" only difference is, now it's "toxoplasmosis and cat scratch fever" instead of witches. Do you have numbers on the prevalence of those ills? As compared to well-known rat-borne illness?
- Euphorbium 4y agoThose with toxoplasmosis are perceived more healthy and attractive, have more lifetime sexual partners[1], take more risk and start their own business more [2] . Seems like a symbiont to me. [1] https://peerj.com/articles/13122/ https://peerj.com/articles/13122/ [2] https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2018.0822 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2018.082...
- AlbertCory 4y agoThe cats start their own business? Plumbing, maybe? https://labs.openai.com/s/ytPYSwCC18wZnN2VSJEOZZgb https://labs.openai.com/s/ytPYSwCC18wZnN2VSJEOZZgb
- asdajksah2123 4y agoI'm pretty sure the rat killing nature of cats is way overstated. Also, in an urban environment where they can much more easily find food thrown in trash, etc., they are unlikely to make an effort to kill rats to obtain that food. Finally, a sufficient cat population that could eradicate a rat problem would likely eradicate the bird population first.
- nemo44x 4y agoThe qualifications for the role are very poor if you're looking for someone to be effective: > Bachelor’s Degree required, preferably public policy, or related design fields, plus 5-8 years of full-time professional experience in a field related to this position > Swashbuckling attitude, crafty humor, and general aura of badassery Wouldn't you value someone who actually knows how to control vermin populations at scale in an urban environment? Why would you value someone who has a "public policy" degree. What even is that? And why does this person need to be a funny pirate? In essence, Jack Sparrow with a public policy degree appears to be the ideal candidate. To me it sounds like they're more interested in giving off the perception of doing something about the problem while entertaining the public about it, rather than actually solving the problem effectively.
- asdajksah2123 4y agoYou see a lot of private companies add silly qualifications like this as well. So I don't really think it indicates anything other than the dept in question trying to be more "hip". That being said, it seems clear now that everything from the Adams administration should be treated as "giving off the perception of doing something instead of solving the problem" until proven otherwise.
- scld 4y ago>Wouldn't you value someone who actually knows how to control vermin populations at scale in an urban environment? Why would you value someone who has a "public policy" degree. What even is that? Probably because the real solution (not putting trash directly onto the streets like it's 1780) isn't going to happen, so a degree in public policy will help make it look like you're actually going to do something.
- conductr 4y agoIt's a management role. They want you to understand and navigate the bureaucracy involved in being a middle manager in city government. Negotiating with Czar of Trash in order to make that real solution a reality, is probably more important than being an expert trap maker. But you definitely want that person on your team!
- slickdork 4y agoQualification: - Swashbuckling attitude, crafty humor, and general aura of badassery I dont want to be the director of rat extermination, but i wouldn't mind working for whoever writes copy on the nyc gov job postings.
- nix23 4y agoThanks for making my day! You described exactly the picture i had in my mind...well plus he was from London and looked a bit like Sherlock Holmes (just for the interview of course). >>New York’s Citywide Director of Rodent Mitigation. That could be also the Director for IT security ;) Being from Europe, is that whole thing New York City humor? It's incredible funny: >>New York City’s rats are legendary for their survival skills, but they don’t run this city – we do.
- yamtaddle 4y agoI'm picturing Quint from Jaws. Y'all know me. Know how I earn a livin'. I'll catch this furball for you, but it ain't gonna be easy. Bad rodent. Not like going down to the sewer and chasing mice and raccoons. This rat, swallow your whole pizza slice. No shakin', no tenderizin', down it goes. And we gotta do it quick, that'll bring back your stock traders, put all your businesses on a payin' basis. But it's not gonna be pleasant. I value my neck a lot more than three thousand bucks, chief. I'll find him for three, but I'll catch him, and kill him, for ten. But you've gotta make up your minds. If you want to stay alive, then ante up. If you want to play it cheap, be on welfare the whole winter. I don't want no volunteers, I don't want no deputies, there's too many CEOs on this island. Ten thousand dollars for me by myself. For that you get the head, the tail, the whole damn thing. (I like that "island" still works because Manhattan)
- chimeracoder 4y agoThe only reason this is a problem is because the city refuses to use containerized trash collection (such as dumpsters). Turns out, dumping trash bags on the street for 12 hours 3-6 times a week is basically a free buffet for rats. The reason the city doesn't implement containerized trash collection is because that would mean giving up a few free parking spots every block. It got worse during COVID-19 because the city temporarily suspended collection/extermination, which caused the rodent population to explode, and it's never recovered from that. But eliminating the regular meals for rats would be an easy, no-brainer way to fix it.
- ruddct 4y agoAn anecdote: My NYC neighborhood has seen a building boom over the past decade. As far as I can tell, every new building puts its trash out on the street. Some particularly memorable examples include a 75 story residential tower with absolutely record-breaking trash piles, and a ~25 story residential tower with a trash collection point on the onramp to the Williamsburg bridge. Garbage trucks have to stop in the road to collect trash, manually, bag-by-bag, at every stop. This is the policy for trash in NYC, and rats will remain a problem as long as it stays that way.
- lazide 4y agoAlso probably due to corruption in the waste management industry. Why make it efficient if it makes it harder to graft?
- walrus01 4y agoGo look at the absolutely massive piles of trash bags outside 20 Exchange Place in the financial district (huge office tower retrofitted to rental apartments) for an example of this. There's nowhere to put dumpsters and obviously no alleyway...
- lazide 4y agoWell, except that folks already get murdered over parking spots in NYC [https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/public-safety/2022/07/19/man-shot-dead-while-reserving-parking-spots-for--law-and-order--set https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/public-safety/2022/07/1...], [https://pix11.com/news/local-news/queens/man-sentenced-to-10-years-over-queens-parking-spot-dispute/ https://pix11.com/news/local-news/queens/man-sentenced-to-10...], [https://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/11/nyregion/dispute-over-a-parking-space-ends-with-a-killing-in-queens.html]… https://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/11/nyregion/dispute-over-a-p...
- tiahura 4y agoHow about training and equipping qualified volunteers to hunt with air rifles and offering a bounty?
- itisit 4y agoThe last thing NYC needs is people walking around with air rifles.
- InCityDreams 4y agoJeeze, you must really hate freedom. Also, according to the nra, crime would be reduced.
- paxys 4y agoIf your goal is to shoot more people than rats, sure.
- ImprobableTruth 4y agoProvides a perverse incentive for people to breed rats/cobra effect [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive#The_original_cobra_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perverse_incentive#The_origina...
- tiahura 4y agoThat's why I restricted to a limited pool - it might make oversight feasible?
- adamsb6 4y agoIs this guerilla marketing for the new King of the Hill series?
- daveslash 4y agoOnly two people need apply: Dale Gribble of Dale's Dead-Bug and.... Rusty Shackleford.
- mnutt 4y agoLiving in NYC with rats, I'm always reminded of Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle, where Jack Shaftoe is in Paris in the late 17th century and meets St-George, the city's preeminent rat-catcher. St-George explains how no one is never going to exterminate _all_ of the rats, so he instead only kills the bad kind of rats and lets the "good" rats live, in a sort of multi-generational rat breeding program. St-George says that he has been doing this for many years, and his father before him, and his father before that. Jack asks, "how do you know the rats aren't breeding YOU?"
- prox 4y agoI had a similar thought today when feeding some crows. Usually they don’t like it when other people show up, and they leave or hide for a bit in a tree or some such. So by proxy I don’t like having people around since we all have to wait. It’s a nice bit of converged purpose I guess where I adapt my behavior as well. Most people who go there are usually oblivious of any birds. They just don’t see it.
- FeistySkink 4y agoWhat do you feed to crows? I feed other birds, but crows never eat the same type of bird food.
- Wistar 4y agoI have found that they like dry, unsalted popcorn. They also like small kibbled dog food, and really go nuts over dried cranberries and unsalted almonds. If there are sunflower seeds in the mix, they are always the last to be eaten.
- FeistySkink 4y agoThem be some fancy crows. I go nuts for everything above, save for the dog food (never tried, TBH). Thanks, I'll try cranberries and almonds.
- lizardactivist 4y agoFirst, it's NY, the dirtiest city in the world and planet earth's own asshole. Second, if the city hasn't realized they need to introduce containerized and properly sealed garbage collection city-wide by now, they never will.
- Invictus0 4y agoPlease. NYC doesn't have half the needles and shit that Philly/San Francisco have. You can at least breathe the air unlike Delhi or Beijing.
- buzzedword 4y agoFeels like a job for Vasiliy Fet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Y4v1l5np_o https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Y4v1l5np_o
- interdrift 4y ago120k to efficiently exterminate rats? Dang, I'd love to do that lol
- paxys 4y ago120k isn't even going to get you an apartment in large parts of NYC.
- interdrift 4y agoThat's OK, I'm quite frugal, don't mind travelling with public transport. Even if you save 50% of that it's already enough for me.
- acuozzo 4y agoSo you take NJ Transit into Port Authority like everyone else does.
- alar44 4y agoYes it will, easily. Just not in Manhattan.
- dropit_sphere 4y agoI feel like the qualifications should just be "competent Civilization player" or something. Actually I think...a lot...of jobs could be filled that way?
- chaorace 4y agoIt has been a long time since I've played a round of Civilization[1], but to this day I still default to framing almost every long-term decision in terms of "building tall" vs. "building wide". And then there's EU4, which has drilled into me an obsession with staring a ledgers all day[2]. [1]: Yaddah, yaddah... "Given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of a game" [2]: An unfortunate habit, given the heightened difficulty of pausing IRL time
- actionablefiber 4y agoUnfortunately, the thing that makes me competent Civilization player is that I spend a lot of time playing Civilization instead of working. I'd be happy to take a job on that basis, but I'm not sure I could keep it.
- 29athrowaway 4y agoI hope it does not end like this: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.atlasobscura.com/articles/hanoi-rat-massacre-1902.amp https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.atlasobscura.com/articles/h...
- dang 4y agoDiscussed a few times: The Great Hanoi Rat Massacre of 1902 Did Not Go as Planned (2017) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30050420 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30050420 - Jan 2022 (4 comments) The Great Hanoi Rat Massacre of 1902 Did Not Go as Planned (2017) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27264816 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27264816 - May 2021 (85 comments) The Great Hanoi Rat Massacre of 1902 Did Not Go as Planned (2017) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19864148 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19864148 - May 2019 (18 comments) The Great Hanoi Rat Massacre of 1902 Did Not Go as Planned - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14499431 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14499431 - June 2017 (1 comment)
- 29athrowaway 4y agoThanks, dang.
- ralusek 4y agoChristopher Walken from Mouse Hunt.
- baidifnaoxi 4y agoIs this talking about rodents or another kind of rat?
- bergenty 4y ago
- n8cpdx 4y ago“The rats are absolutely going to hate this announcement. But the rats don’t run this city. We do” has become a top tier audio meme. I think I hear this in my head about as often as I see “(x) Doubt” or “This is fine (dog engulfed in flames)” NYC really did a great job with the marketing on this. I think the real reason TikTok was successful is it popularized the audio/video meme and the means for them to go viral. https://www.indy100.com/viral/rats-dont-run-this-city-we-do-tiktok-sound https://www.indy100.com/viral/rats-dont-run-this-city-we-do-...
- lotsofpulp 4y agoWhatever it popularized is the exact opposite of what entertains me. I was recently sent a link to tiktok that was a video set to random music of a single screenshot of a single tweet. My younger self had higher hopes for humanity.
- sushzbdbehsh 4y agoimagine if someone linked me your comment and i deduced that hackernews was just low effort old people complaining about things
- whimsicalism 4y agoYou wouldn't be wrong.
- bkishan 4y agoAnd also "This is not Ratatouille. Rats are not our friends".
- Justsignedup 4y agoOkay so New York is complaining about companies offering unreasonable salary ranges... And then they offer $120k - $170k! Like seriously that's a gigantic difference for the same one position. God damn NYC.
- nadieyninguno1 4y agoSo with government jobs there is an expectation of a much longer tenure than the 3 year job hopper we have in programming. You’ll start on the low end and get a 2k bump per year for a decade or two, eventually hitting the cap.
- thaumasiotes 4y agoThe difference between the high end of the range and the low end is more than $2000 / year over 20 years can make up.
- nadieyninguno1 4y ago3% of $120k is $3,600 20 years of $3,600 is $72,000 This is beyond the range stated. Having worked for years in IT for a municipal service, our standard formula was a raise of 0% to 3% based on a performance rating, with 0% being "you're on a PIP and going to be fired soon" and 3% being a top-performer. This is speculation at this point - but I would assume NYC works against a similar system.
- fakedang 4y agoIf NYC needs someone who can deal with their rats, they should look west and think about hiring Richard Hendricks.
- exo762 4y agoPied Piper of New York. They better pay him well.
- zxcvbn4038 4y ago"Nuke the entire site from orbit--it's the only way to be sure"
- nxm 4y agoRats would still survive
- erikig 4y agoNot just survive - thrive; you'll have taken out all their competition.
- olyjohn 4y agoAnd who is going to throw trash on the street for the rats to feed on?
- zxcvbn4038 4y agoThe mafia will make billions by paying an army of crazy homeless people to feed garbage to the radioactive zombie rats and then charging the government to remove the rats - which will somehow end up in Mexico in dead government informants. The NY government will then get in on the racket and make capturing radioactive rats illegal without possession of one of three rat disposal licenses that are auctioned to the highest bidder each year on condition that rat feed be purchased from the NY government, and any proceeds be split evenly with the MTA — which still spends $49 billion a year on overtime despite no workers, riders, subways, or buses having survived the initial nuclear strike.
- calculatte 4y agoTo be most successful, you need to start with the rats at city hall
- ericzawo 4y ago"All animals are equal but some are more equal than others."
- monrir 4y ago"Successful candidates must be highly organized, able to burrow into the depths of city government"
- andylei 4y agobut also > Proficiency with Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint
- terminatornet 4y agoto me, the people at city hall are more clown-like, which would require some sort of clown exterminator.
- caseyohara 4y agoMy grandmother had an island. Nothing to boast of. You could walk around it in an hour, but still it was, it was a paradise for us. One summer, we went for a visit and discovered the place had been infested with rats! They'd come on a fishing boat and gorged themselves on coconut. So how do you get rats off an island? Hmm? My grandmother showed me. We buried an oil drum and hinged the lid. Then we wired coconut to the lid as bait and the rats would come for the coconut, and they would fall into the drum. And after a month, you have trapped all the rats, but what do you do then? Throw the drum into the ocean? Burn it? No. You just leave it and they begin to get hungry. And one by one they start eating each other, until there are only two left. The two survivors. And then what? Do you kill them? No. You take them and release them into the trees, but now they don't eat coconut anymore. Now, they only eat rat. You have changed their nature. (Silva's opening monologue in Skyfall)
- 4y ago
- insane_dreamer 4y ago> ... 5-8 years of full-time professional experience in a field related to this position. Rat killing is a field?
- libraryatnight 4y agoAnimal/pest control is
- zokier 4y agoPest/rodent control? Definitely a field. Although I suspect they are meaning public administration here.
- bombcar 4y agoPerhaps they mean literally 5-8 years standing in a field killing rats in said field. Because then you'd be outstanding in your field.
- yetanotherloser 4y agoVery good.
- tsol 4y agoDo you have to be out standing in your field, or is it okay if you're laid back?
- jiveturkey 4y agowell, yes. pest and rodent removal and such.
- somerandomqaguy 4y agoAlberta, Canada maintains a team of dedicated rat exterminators paid for by the province. Along with a near genocidal government policy towards rats. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/alberta-canada-rat-free-for-70-years/2019/09/27/4caf1cb6-de2b-11e9-be7f-4cc85017c36f_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/alberta-ca...
- Ericson2314 4y agoWill they put the trash in containers that go were parked cars do today? If the answer is no, folks we're just wasting our time.
- jxramos 4y agome and a friend were just talking yesterday about the insane trash day behaviors in NYC. How is it that piles of bagged garbage on the sidewalk has been accepted as normal as if a plastic bag is any barrier to a rodent or any other determined creature.
- theGnuMe 4y agoqueue the movie about this: Caddyshack 2.0
- RickJWagner 4y agoI bet the successful candidate will sound just like Bogey: "You.... dirty rat!"
- schwartzworld 4y agoThat's James Cagney, not Bogart
- ComputerGuru 4y agoThey should hire Joseph Carter, better known as the Mink Man! I still can't believe he went from someone I stumbled across on YouTube in a low-quality shaky-cam video 10 years ago (or was it more?) to making NYT headlines (and he deserves it): https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/30/science/mink-animals-pest-control.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/30/science/mink-animals-pest... His YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/josephcartertheminkman https://www.youtube.com/c/josephcartertheminkman
- konfusinomicon 4y agoyes! what an amazing channel! those minks are murderous assassins! 5th Avenue would run red with rat blood if they set joseph carter free in NYC
- bitxbitxbitcoin 4y agoMink Man is the man for the job.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- AviationAtom 4y agohttps://archive.ph/zQrd4 https://archive.ph/zQrd4
- aklein 4y agoKudos to the person who wrote the job description
- cuttothechase 4y agoThis honestly appears to be a very difficult problem to solve. It seems that to be truly be effective in rat reduction at a city scale the fix may need to come from elsewhere and may have very little to do with directly working on exterminating the rats. Fixes may be needed starting from urban planning through waste/sewage handling methods at a street level all the way up to the city. Also not sure if there would be enough leverage and incentives for any candidate who is going to be hired for this job at their advertised $120K to be able to achieve that kind of a change! Seems like another easy win for the rats at the tax payers expense!
- colechristensen 4y agoWhy not feral cats? Considerably more pleasant than rats. Or like teams of trained dogs.
- dymk 4y agoCats kill everything, not just rats Ratting dogs are certainly a thing, but it’s probably unsafe to release a bunch of dogs into the sewers.
- coffeebeqn 4y agoYeah the dogs will die and then it’ll be an outrage. I’ve seen them work on a field but the sewers and subway tunnels etc. are very hazardous and dark
- theshrike79 4y agoIf you have a mouse, get a cat. If your problem is hundreds of mice, get terriers. They just kill and move on, they don't play with the mouse or eat it. https://youtu.be/l2Pyu-Cj0gg https://youtu.be/l2Pyu-Cj0gg
- moralestapia 4y agoWhoa very ... interesting video. Makes one feel fascinated and troubled at the same time.
- bredren 4y agoThere is a fascinating history of rats in New York City provided in the book, Rats: Observations on the History & Habitat of the City's Most Unwanted Inhabitants. The author, Robert Sullivan, delivers the influence of rats and ratting on the American Revolution. It goes so far as to draw a connection between rats and the Boston Massacre, IIRC. It made me look at rats in a new way, I highly recommend this book.
- no_wizard 4y agoHonestly based on this job description I can't wait to see who they hire. Sounds like they'll need to be quite the character.
- Avlin67 4y agono rats ? close all restaurants. fixed.
- Sugimot0 4y agoI hope this is a Ratatouille reference
- Avlin67 4y agoThe city of Bordeaux France took the decision to not kill rats https://amp.lepoint.fr/2500131 https://amp.lepoint.fr/2500131 as it is countrr productive and rats are actually needed
- karaterobot 4y agoHas any city ever had success reducing the rat population by a significant amount and keeping it down over a long term? My memory from reading some book about rats a long time ago is that they haven't, though of course that could be wrong. This job may be more about managing a losing battle.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- lmm 4y agoI've heard the province of Alberta eliminated their rats and keep them gone, though that still requires constant vigilance.
- NaturalPhallacy 4y ago>Director of Rodent Mitigation This a ridiculous title, or have I just read too many fantasy novels where they're just called "Ratter". Malazan and their ratter guild comes to mind. The about section however is a pretty rad: >Do you have what it takes to do the impossible? A virulent vehemence for vermin? A background in urban planning, project management, or government? And most importantly, the drive, determination and killer instinct needed to fight the real enemy – New York City’s relentless rat population? Final though: I think it should definitely include terriers (the OG ratters). Those would be some happy dogs.
- ElijahLynn 4y agoWhat? "...even attempt to control the movements of kitchen staffers in an effort to take over human jobs." from "Rodents spread disease, damage homes and wiring, and even attempt to control the movements of kitchen staffers in an effort to take over human jobs."
- jayd16 4y agoRatatouille movie reference.
- ratatouilleyo 4y agoIt's a reference to the movie Ratatouille.
- ElijahLynn 4y agoSalary Range: $120,000 - $170,000
- ultra_nick 4y agoWhat would happen if NYC imported 1,000,000 cats from around the country and set them loose?
- ch4s3 4y agoThe rats often live in walls, pipes, drains, and so on.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- DavidSJ 4y agoI was thinking anti-rationalist sentiment had gone pretty far, but I had no idea.
- loki49152 4y agoNo mention of Strigoi. I guess they're still covering that up.
- keepquestioning 4y agoFuck rats.
- animex 4y agoThey need to hire Alberta's Rat Czar. The only place in the world that is largely rat-free. https://gem.cbc.ca/media/absolutely-canadian/s22e33?cmp=sch-menace https://gem.cbc.ca/media/absolutely-canadian/s22e33?cmp=sch-... https://livewirecalgary.com/2022/09/21/calgary-filmmaker-alberta-rat-patrol/ https://livewirecalgary.com/2022/09/21/calgary-filmmaker-alb...
- slim 4y agothat claim is stupid. for example, most places where cats are endemic don't have rats (rome, istambul, tunis, ...)
- Reason077 4y agoWhat I want to know is: what happened to the last NYC rat killer?
- jrockway 4y agoWent after the wrong rat.
- tdehnel 4y agoI like how NYC is cleaning up its act lately. It’s like it got over Covid and suddenly realized it’s the greatest city in the world and better start acting like it.
- mancerayder 4y agoIt also is swinging back towards caring about quality of life issues after a bout of other (and unachieved) priorities in the last two mayoral terms.
- woodruffw 4y agoThis isn’t remotely accurate. Mayoral politics in NYC is eternally dominated by basic quality of life issues. It’s the single thing that dominates voting in the city. I’ve been much more impressed with the city council than the mayor as of late. Our esteemed mayor seems to have more of a taste for cutting QoL projects (like compost collection, and bike lane expansion) than he does for cultivating them.
- mancerayder 4y agoHugely editorialized. DeBlasio routinely dismissed quality of life issues, instructing the NYPD to cease enforcement on the subways, cutting the sanitation budget, and a hundred other things. The homeless population and petty crime blossomed even before covid. Adams was elected literally because of the backlash. Whether he's effective can be debated, sure.
- School-Cotton 4y agoWhat makes New York the “greatest city in the world”? People from New York like to say that but I’ve never understood why it’s true in any objective sense.
- charlie0 4y agoA pied piper?
- 8bitsrule 4y agoNYC has a contest for 'top rat-killer' now?
- jkrubin 4y agoThey should hire my Australian cattle dog (bash aka babydog)
- jelliclesfarm 4y agoVermin is a problem in high density cities world over.
- boringg 4y agoHope they don’t follow Hanoi’s rat problem solutions. “The great Hanoi rat massacre did not go as planned” Fantastic read by the way —-> https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/hanoi-rat-massacre-1902.amp https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/hanoi-rat-massacre-190...
- jelliclesfarm 4y agohttps://www.harappa.com/slide/mouse-or-rat-trap https://www.harappa.com/slide/mouse-or-rat-trap : a Harappan clay mouse trap. Similar to another found in Mohenjadaro too. Man vs Mouse, never ends.
- _8j50 4y agoWhy not ask all the nations shelters (especially the killing ones) to ship all their cats to nyc? Why is NYC above the age-old rat mitigation? Works for Istanbul.
- jalapenos 4y agoCats don't actually hunt rats much, surprisingly, because they're usually too big (versus the mice that are their bread and butter). There are other animals that do, but not sure people want hordes of foxes, for instance, in place of the rats.
- _8j50 4y agoThey hunt squirrels, are nyc rats really that big?? Wow.
- blamazon 4y agoThey'd be hit by cars, it would be so sad. Speaking of, the cars are the real problem - the rats proliferate on garbage, of course. So, to cut their food source, the garbage must be hidden from the rats until it is collected: This is axiomatic in my eyes. To hide the garbage, it makes the most sense to just place it inside a modular rat-proof container that is plopped onto a parking space. But it's politically very difficult in NYC to take away parking spaces, especially at a scale that would be required to house all the trash. It's also not possible to go underground like Europe does. Thus, to truly solve this problem, NYC has to tackle the automobile problem head on and that hasn't been politically popular there for a long time. (Thanks, Robert Moses!) But I'm optimistic for change!
- InCityDreams 4y ago>It's also not possible to go underground like Europe does. I belive you may be thinking of a couple of [well to do] places in The Netherlands, which despite being in Europe, does not represent it all (unfortunately). Other European places would have the same problem as NYC regarding going underground...lotta wires and cables and pipes and tubes and tree roots down there.
- oliv__ 4y agoI find it funny that after all the talk about requiring reasonable salary ranges for jobs in NYC, the city itself is sort of skirting the rule by including a very wide range: upper range is >40% higher than lower range.
- lepetitpedre 4y agoWell this could work: https://www.reddit.com/r/jackrussellterrier/comments/l2qbf4/in_denmark_some_towns_use_rat_catcher_dogs_this/ https://www.reddit.com/r/jackrussellterrier/comments/l2qbf4/...
- thenoblesunfish 4y ago"Rat killer" is a funny headline but I hope (though I'm not that confident) that this person will not focus on directly killing rats. To state the obvious, for that to work you have to kill rats as fast as they reproduce (which is fast) and the second you stop the situation goes right back to where it was. To take a cue from what seems to work with pigeons, they need to provide less rat food and/or limit reproduction. The second one is easier with pigeons (you can build roosts for them, then replace the eggs with fake ones - this is really done).
- supervillain 4y agoThey need to ship all of the rats from New York City to the Sahara desert to turn it back into a jungle.
- m1117 4y agoKitties!!!
- SentientAtom 4y agoWhat is the deal with juvenile humor in business and government listings? That is an immediate red flag, "derp we're so fun here you're a team player that wants to be part of an inclusive and collaborative family where you can watch your career bloom". Pass.
- helsinkiandrew 4y ago> What is the deal with juvenile humor in business and government listings? Humor in this listing meant the ad got publicity and was read more widely - it gives the Mayor some brownie points showing they're doing something useful. It also got the ad read by more potential candidates so the quality of applicants will be higher.
- RationPhantoms 4y agoI find it refreshing. The job entails the suppression of the NYC population of rats, wouldn't you want it to be dressed up a bit?
- mypastself 4y agoAmusing seeing this just below the “Who’s hiring” thread. C’mon guys, I know all about the recent tech layoffs as well as burnout, but switching careers to rodent mitigation is pushing it…
- UberFly 4y agoI don't know. I'm kinda wishing I was qualified for this...
- black_13 4y ago
- shp0ngle 4y agoJust get Pied Piper.
- paul7986 4y agoJust in nyc week ago and dont recall seeing that many rats in one visit. Though I have never ventured to Hell's Kitchen before as I did this time. Still love NYC ..such a great vibe!
- codemusings 4y agoAs a European I'm amused how accurate Spin City was in such aspects. Also that city logo looks like it was created in the early 90s.
- WhackyIdeas 4y agoIt might seem a rather simplistic and naive, but what if bins (do Americans call them trash cans?) were raised high enough with feet which literally resist climbing or jumping rats from getting to their juicy New York pizza?
- eska 4y agoI think you severely underestimate the climbing and jumping ability of mice and rats.
- WhackyIdeas 4y agoCan they jump a metre high? If so, what about 2 metres? The bins can be as high as necessary.