By Megan Sayles
AFRO Staff Writer
msayles@afro.com
Forty-five-year-old Djorrel Dunn had been a laborer for the Baltimore City Department of Public Works (DPW) for 18 years before deciding that something needed to change. He had no choice. Dunn says the job’s physical toll on his body left him on the operating table on three separate occasions due to elbow, knee and shoulder injuries.
While on light duty after his third surgery, Dunn decided to obtain his Commercial Driver’s License (CDL). He needed reprieve from working behind the truck. The 10 hours of manual labor had simply become too much.
“It’s a real physical job, and it’s like they don’t care about us,” said Dunn. “They care more about trash than they care about us.”
The Baltimore City Department of Public Works (DPW) has been under scrutiny for substandard working conditions following the on-the-job deaths of two waste workers, Ronald Silver II and Timothy Cartwell. Both men died just months apart from each other in 2024, with Silver succumbing to heat in August and Cartwell crushed to death in November.
Prior to the deaths, Baltimore Inspector General Isabel Mercedes Cumming issued a scathing report after visiting DPW facilities and observing what she described as “dangerous conditions.”
Now, co-workers of Silver and Cartwell are coming forward with their own concerns, ranging from unfair compensation to retaliation from supervisors for reporting workplace injuries.
“When I was a laborer, we would get threatened when we would call out sick or get hurt behind the truck. We would have to go on light duty, and they started treating us badly,” said Dunn. “They would take you off of your main truck. It was like we were in the doghouse.”
Today, Dunn is a solid waste driver, but he remembers enduring harsher treatment from his supervisors in his former position. He also said he’s still grieving the untimely, preventable deaths of his colleagues.
Silver, 36, died of hyperthermia, a heat-related illness, in August 2024 as temperatures climbed to 100 degrees. Cartwell, 60, was crushed by a trash truck in November.
“I just try to be as safe as I can and keep my men as safe as I can,” said Dunn.
Like Dunn, Kevin Hill attempted to receive his CDL to become a truck driver for the department. Ultimately, he was unsuccessful. When he arrived for training he was instead removed from the class. He still does not know the reason why.
“The only thing I know is that when I came to class, the instructor told me that ‘they’ told him to put me out of the class. I wasn’t going to argue with the man,” said Hill. “I just left.”
The AFRO reached out to DPW with an interview request to discuss the complaints heard from Baltimore City’s DPW workers. While a statement was promised, as of Jan. 28 no comment from DPW had been received by the publication.
Hill told the AFRO it wasn’t the only time he was denied opportunities to advance within the agency.
“This has been ongoing. I’ve never had an interview for anything I’ve [applied] for since 2017,” said Hill. “Somehow, all the departments have ‘lost’ my paperwork.”
He maintains that during his 13 years with DPW, he has always arrived an hour early and has never missed a day of work.
Hill shared email correspondence he sent to American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Local #44 leadership with the AFRO, showing his attempts to understand why he was kicked out of the CDL class. He also asked union leadership to explain why he hadn’t been selected to interview for new positions and how his applications were lost. The emails were sent in May, June and July 2024. As of January 2025, Hill says he has still not received a reply to any of his inquiries.
Hill alleges that some hires in the agency have been a result of nepotism, with candidates securing roles they are unqualified to do.
“I need them to get rid of everybody who shouldn’t even be there,” said Hill. “Check their qualifications and see how they really got there.”
Stancil McNair, an employee of DPW for 13 years, took to social media last summer to denounce the department for its poor working conditions, and he’s continued to advocate for better treatment.
He said there has been some progress made as a result of the media frenzy sparked by the deaths of Silver and Cartwell.
“I don’t want anybody to think that they haven’t made any changes,” said McNair. “They did do a lot of training as far as the supervisors, but at the same time, this is like a wound that’s been opened for so long that it’s infected. Now you have to get all of the infection out before you can close the wound up.”
Right now, McNair said his biggest issue is the pay he and his co-workers receive. Currently, he makes $21 an hour, but he’s started a side hustle making logos and murals to offset his living expenses.
“With the cost of living going up, we are not getting raises. We are basically working for nothing,” said McNair. “People are really fighting for overtime to make it. That’s how bad it is.”
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