It was too dangerous for the men and women who collect Washington's garbage to meet indoors anymore, so instead, more than 50 of them gathered on the sprawling lot where their trucks spent the night. In the predawn darkness, the glow from the light poles overhead glinted off reflective stripes on their uniforms, designed to keep them safe. Now, though, almost none of them felt safe.
Word had spread that one of their own had tested positive for coronavirus. The director of the District's Department of Public Works stood at the center of the crowd in Northeast on the first day of a new workweek and asked everyone to spread out at least six feet apart. The work they did was perilous but essential, he said. That's why they would soon get hazard pay.
"Man, f--k the money," one worker shouted, but the director didn't react. He understood his people — whom he had just compared to first responders — were scared. The drivers would soon head across a city that looked and sounded and felt nothing at all like the most powerful place on earth. But even on a day when the District's mayor would join the governors of Maryland and Virginia in ordering residents to stay home, meals were served, meetings were held, dogs were walked, jokes were cracked, babies were born, prayers were delivered.
And, of course, trash was collected.
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