The Trash Revolt: San Diegans Say Enough Is Enough to Mayor Todd Gloria’s New Fees

San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria smiles with a trash can and residents angry about rising trash fees. (This photo is satire)

By San Diego Monitor News Staff

San Diego’s patience is wearing thin. From Paradise Hills to Clairemont, from Rancho Bernardo to Southcrest, the same refrain is echoing through backyards and block parties: “We’re getting nickel-and-dimed to death.” This time, it’s not the potholes or the parking tickets—it’s the trash fee.

A century-old promise has been tossed to the curb, and homeowners are furious. For the first time in more than a hundred years, single-family homeowners in San Diego are being billed directly for trash pickup, a service once covered by property taxes since before most residents’ grandparents were born. San Diegans are calling it betrayal. Across social media, neighborhood boards, and kitchen-table conversations, San Diegans are venting about what they see as the city’s latest money grab. “It’s not about twenty-five dollars a month,” says one resident, a homeowner in North Park. “It’s about trust. Todd Gloria told us this was about fairness, but we weren’t told the real story—that it’s about plugging budget holes they created.”

At City Hall, the mayor’s allies on the council pushed through the measure, arguing that the city’s long-standing People’s Ordinance, which guaranteed free trash collection for single-family homes, was outdated and unfair to renters who already paid private haulers. But many homeowners see through that framing. “Don’t tell me it’s about fairness,” says another resident from Mira Mesa. “You could’ve lowered rents. Instead, you raised everyone’s costs. This is politics dressed up as policy.” Even some former Gloria supporters are openly questioning his judgment.

The city says the new trash fee will generate tens of millions annually to shore up the solid-waste system, replace trucks, and modernize recycling. But for many residents, that argument smells worse than a black bin in August. A lawsuit now winding its way through court argues exactly that: the fee violates Proposition 218, California’s taxpayer-protection law that forbids local governments from disguising new taxes as fees. “We’re ready to go to trial and ready to prove our case that the City is attempting to collect an unconstitutional fee by illegal means. And they are doing this to cover a hole in the budget because they didn’t get passage of the 1-cent sale tax increase ballot measure.” Said Attorney Michael Aguirre who represents the plantiffs in the case.

The trash-fee backlash is fast becoming a political bonfire. Petitions are circulating to put a repeal measure on the 2026 ballot. Activists are calling it the People’s Ordinance 2.0. City Hall insiders whisper that Gloria’s inner circle underestimated the blowback—assuming residents would quietly absorb the fee as “just another utility.” Instead, it’s become a symbol of a mayor who’s lost touch with everyday San Diegans juggling grocery prices, gas costs, and housing shocks. “The city’s elite are running this place like a business park, not a community,” says a homeowner in Valencia Park. “We’re supposed to be America’s Finest City, not America’s most taxed.”

Once hailed as a consensus builder, Todd Gloria now finds himself at odds with the neighborhoods that once lifted him to victory. Yard signs in Kensington and Tierrasanta that used to read “Todd Gets It Done” are being replaced with homemade banners that say, “Todd, Take Out Your Own Trash.” Even renters—supposedly the winners of the new fee structure—are souring on the mayor, pointing out that landlords are already passing the costs on to them. At its core, this isn’t just about garbage. It’s about governance.

The people of San Diego feel their leaders have stopped listening, trading empathy for expediency and community for convenience. The trash fee was the match, but the frustration has been building for years.

San Diego is known for sunshine, surf, and civic pride. But lately that pride is curdling into resentment. From city budget meetings to neighborhood gatherings, residents are speaking out—sometimes shaking their trash cans for emphasis. And if the mayor’s office thought this storm would pass quietly, it may find that San Diegans, once known for politeness, have found their voice—and they’re not throwing it away.

The San Diego Monitor News reached out to Mayor Todd Gloria’s communications team for comment but did not receive one prior to this story running.