Food waste control is rodent control, and I’m excited to see this strategy prioritized in the Rodent Education and Management Yields Results Amendment Act of 2026 that Councilmember Christina Henderson introduced and the Council approved on first reading earlier this week. The bill will help D.C. provide businesses rodent-proof trash cans and educate the public on effective rodent prevention and control.  

I’ve worked with the Department of Public Works to expand their curbside collection contract for single-family dwellings and supported their project of placing smart bins throughout the city so that people who live in multifamily buildings have a convenient place to take food scraps. And while I previously thought of composting primarily from an environmental perspective—a way to slow our contribution to landfills—I now know that it can really make the difference in our rat prevention efforts, too, by making sure that rats do not have enough food to reproduce. 

I get why people are frustrated and feel like they need to resort to rodenticide. But rodenticides don’t really solve the problem, and they can lead to a population rebound that makes things even worse. Plus, these chemicals harm children and wildlife. That’s why I was happy to work with Councilmember Henderson and Councilmember Janeese Lewis-George on this issue and bring our collective efforts to the floor in this bill.