A NYC council member is expanding a rat-killing program in her district that pumps carbon monoxide into the nasty rodent’s burrows — which she claims is “100 percent” effective.
Council member Julie Menin, who represents District 5, said the program has led to a “remarkable reduction” in vermin since it began last winter on the Upper East Side.
“We went from getting inundated with complaints to our office from residents and businesses on East 86th Street, to — we’re not getting complaints anymore,” Menin told The Post on Monday.
“In fact, all we’re getting is people calling us and saying, ‘Can you bring this to our block?’”
The answer to that is a resounding yes, Menin said.
“We’re going to go to other blocks with this technique,” she added. “It really works … We are attacking one of the main places that they populate.”
The exterminator — in this case, Matthew Deodato of the firm Urban Pest Management — uses a machine called Burrow Rx to pump the gas into the burrows, according to Gothamist
But it’s not dangerous to people, pets or the Big Apple’s other wildlife because it dissipates quickly, Deodato told the site. And the machine creates smoke out of vegetable oil so he can make sure it’s not wafting in a direction it shouldn’t.
He also carries a spiked garden hoe to finish off survivors — though he tries not to kill them around witnesses.
Deodato’s method “demonstrated an impressive eradication rate of nearly 100 percent in the tree pits where it was applied,” Menin’s office said in the release.
The extermination program is funded by $20,000 from the city’s Cleanup NYC initiative, which gives money to every council member for sanitation-related services, Menin said.
Business owners and residents alike have complimented the program — and some private property owners have begun doing it themselves.
“We went from an ongoing battle against 100 burrows to occasional maintenance of one or two,” Andrew Fine, Secretary & Treasurer of the East 86th Street Association, said in the release.
“What an amazing difference,” he continued. “We are so happy that this program will be expanded so other problem areas can see similar success.”
New York has upped the intensity of its fight against the plague of four-legged freeloaders in recent months, with Mayor Eric Adams going so far as to name Kathleen Corradi the Big Apple’s first-ever “rat czar” in April.
Corradi reports directly to the mayor, who famously loathes rats and rages about them constantly.
Adams has said outdoor dining sparked by the pandemic may have worsened the city’s infestation, and he’s signed legislation and implemented policies to wipe out the rodents.
Earlier this month, the mayor announced that some homes will have to buy new garbage cans as the city tries to modernize its trash collection services.
But in a good bit of irony, Adams himself was hit with a $300 fine in February after rodents were discovered in his Brooklyn townhouse.
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