NYCs winning Eric Adams war on rats LA should give him a call

New York City is winning ex-Mayor Eric Adams’ war on rats — and it looks like Los Angeles should give him a call.Gotham’s 311 line got about 9,900 calls for rats in the first seven months of 2026 — a 22% drop from 2025 and the first time the number fell below 10,000 for that period since 2020.And everyone knows Adams deserves the credit — since no past mayor had ever dared declare this war, which seemed unwinnable.Yet he and then-Sanitation Commissioner Jessica Tisch got it done, with aggressive animal control and innovations like the sealed Empire Bins that replaced easy-access piles of trash and overflowing cans on the streets.Now, more than 70% of New York City’s trash has to be in sealed containers, and the city plans to hit 100% by 2031.Manhattan Community Board 9 reports a 35% drop in rat sightings since the bins were installed last year.Now, over to LA — battling a typhus outbreak thanks to rampant rats. Typhus cases are up 2,300% since 2009, and every recent year has set a new record — while city and county governments barely even wring their hands.Last year, Los Angeles “won” the top spot on pest-control firm Orkin’s decade-old annual list of the most rat-infested major cities in America — the first time Chicago didn’t rank as worst.Subscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter! Please provide a valid email.

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LA authorities claim they just lack the resources to get ahead of the rodents, though the city has a $15 billion budget and the county $50 billion.They could blame Gov.Gavin Newsom and Sacramento, which in 2020 restricted rat poisons in the name of protecting wildlife, and then passed harsher limits in 2024.Or they could simply beg Eric Adams to come to town and install him as rat czar, with all the support he demands.Winning the war on rats starts with leadership, which the City of...