By NEAL WAGNER / City Editor

Pelham residents will see a reduction in their monthly garbage collection bills, and will have their recycling picked up every week once the city’s new trash pickup company begins serving the city in the next few months.

During its Aug. 19 meeting, the Pelham City Council voted unanimously to award the city’s residential trash pickup bid to the Pelham-based Trash Taxi. Through the three-year contract, Trash Taxi will charge residents $9.61 per month for weekly curbside garbage and recycling pickup.

The current rate for single-container garbage pickup is $10.43. Rates for two-, three- and four-container residential garbage pickup will not change.

Currently, recycling is collected every two weeks, said Council President Rick Hayes.

“This is weekly recycling versus every other week now. We’ve had a deal with people not knowing if (recycling pickup) was this week or next week a lot,” Hayes said.

According to the resolution passed by the council, the new contract is set to go into effect between Oct. 1, 2013 and Jan. 1, 2014 after the company’s owner, Roberto Rodriguez, previously expressed concern with starting on Oct. 1. During an Aug. 7 council meeting, Rodriguez and Waste Pro representative Todd White said it would be difficult for a trash company to have time to order new trash bins and trucks to serve the city if the contract went into effect on Oct. 1.

During the Aug. 19 meeting, the council also voted to extend the city’s contract with its current residential trash pickup company, Allied Waste, until Trash Taxi begins serving the city.

As a result of the contract extension with Allied Waste, the company will not hold its regularly scheduled heavy trash pickup day in October.

“It would not be fair to ask Allied to do that,” Hayes said. “(Trash Taxi) will in the future, per the contract.”