In Central CT, trash collection is run by big companies like All Waste, but in Western CT, there's all those little trash collecting companies, and the corporate trash collectors can't get a foothold. I wonder why that is? A kid I went to school with runs one of the local trash companies and almost went to prison just for cutting deals with Galante, who was a competitor.

There's also active mob in Hartford, but they're more active in construction, sports books, vending machines, drugs, etc. They've been dying out though. The current generation is much less powerful than the last one. I used to go to a restaurant in the South End where you could place bets with the bookie bartender and eat Italian food with all the old mobsters, but it was sold, bulldozed and replaced with a chain store a decade ago.

Ever since RICO, a lot of the smarter young guys are figuring out that it's easier and safer to make money in the private sector. That's leading to a brain drain leaving the knuckleheads in charge of the rackets, so they keep getting weaker with time.