By STEPHANIE BRUMFIELD / Staff Writer

COLUMBIANA – The Columbiana City Council voted to limit commercial trash can sizes to 40 gallons at a meeting Oct. 1 after receiving complaints from both businesses and trash collectors.

Columbiana Mayor Stancil Handley said the request was made by “the guys on the front line” who are having to empty 100-gallon trash cans by hand. The city unanimously voted to change the maximum can size for commercial customers to 40 gallons while making no changes to requirements for residential customers, whose cans are limited to 30 gallons.

The city has also received complaints from those businesses with 100-gallon cans, saying not all of their trash is being picked up, Handley said.

“The new policy is best for everybody,” he said.

In other business, the city is in the process of working on a budget for the current fiscal year, which began Oct. 1. “The new budget is due today,” Handley said at the Oct. 1 meeting. “The reason we’re not there is because you’ve got a relatively new mayor … and we’re trying to make a fair budget.”

But Handley assured those in attendance that the Columbiana city government would not stop.

“No matter what they do in Washington, we’re not going to shut down the government of Columbiana,” he said.

Last year, the city didn’t finish the budget until February, but Handley said the goal is to finish it by the end of October this year.