In the last year and a half, San Franciscans have called in more than 1 million complaints to the city’s 311 service hotline. A breakdown of those calls shows that some of the most common complaints were about trash, illegal dumping and graffiti — issues the city has struggled to keep up with since the pandemic as the public works department faced staffing shortages.

“We had been challenged by vacancies in our street cleaning operation, which were exacerbated during the global COVID pandemic,” said Rachel Gordon, a spokesperson for Public Works. “But we have been making good progress in recent months to replenish the ranks.”

Trash complaints made up the biggest share — about 16% — of overall calls, The Chronicle’s analysis of 311 case data between January 2022 and June 2023 shows. Listed as “general cleaning” in the database, these requests are usually handled by Public Works.

Loose garbage and illegal dumping complaints fall under the category of street and sidewalk cleaning in the city’s database. Illegal dumping complaints have quadrupled in the last decade. Public Works has a goal to respond to 95% of street and sidewalk cleaning requests within 48 hours and according to its performance scorecard, the responsiveness has been below target since 2021.

Bulky item pickup requests, which are handled by the city’s partnering waste management company Recology, were the second-most-common type of complaint, at 15% of overall calls since 2022, the data also shows.

Besides trash and illegal dumping, graffiti cleanup was also among the top 311 service requests. San Franciscans called in over 125,000 graffiti-related complaints — more than 12% of overall calls — since 2022. Public Works’ goal, according to the scorecard, is to respond to graffiti requests on public property within 48 hours and on private property in 72 hours. But since 2021, the department’s “on-time” response rate has been below 55%, even reaching a low point of 14% in 2022.

Laws that compelled private property owners to remove graffiti from their properties were halted by the Board of Supervisors during the pandemic, which slowed graffiti cleanups, Gordon explained. The department has since resumed inspections, she added. The department also began an opt-in pilot program late last year to provide free graffiti abatement for certain private properties and businesses.

In terms of where most of these complaints and service requests are coming from, the Mission District had the highest volume of calls, with nearly 114,000 calls between January 2022 and June 2023.

But when looking at the rate of calls based on population, neighborhoods in downtown San Francisco stand out more. The Financial District and Downtown/Union Square neighborhoods had the highest call rates during this time period, at 6,400 and 4,300 calls per thousand residents, respectively.

The highest share of main complaints from these two neighborhoods was for overflowing city garbage cans, making up over 20% of all calls in both neighborhoods’ cases. Garbage can-related calls made up only 7% of complaints citywide.

A recent assessment of the city’s streets and sidewalks from the Controller’s Office also found that litter and dumping issues concentrated in high-traffic, commercial areas like downtown.

Gordon said Public Works has stepped up its cleaning efforts at U.N. Plaza in March of this year, coming through every two hours during the day and early evening and two more times overnight. The department has also expanded its illegal dumping cleanup operation in the Bayview from four days a week to five, she added.

Nearly $17 million of the mayor’s proposed budget will be incorporated into street cleaning, according to Gordon. If approved by the Board of Supervisors, she said these funds will go toward expanded steam cleaning throughout the city, additional manual block sweeping and graffiti removal.