The Board of Mayor and Aldermen will decide May 10 whether to reject the proposals for solid waste collection submitted April 17 and re-advertise for garbage collection.

The board Monday took under advisement a recommendation by the city’s seven-member solid waste committee to reject the proposals submitted by Arrow Disposal Service, Express Waste, Metro Service Group, Riverbend Environmental Services, Team Waste Jackson and Waste Pro of Mississippi.

The committee reviewed the proposals after they were received by the city. The decision to reject, assistant public works director and committee member Jeff Richardson told the board, was unanimous.

Mayor George Flaggs Jr. recommended the board reach a decision on the proposals at its May 10 meeting. “I don’t think this needs to be hanging over,” he said.

The city’s contract with Houston, Texas-based Waste Management expires June 30. Waste Management’s proposal was rejected April 18 because it was submitted after the 9 a.m. deadline.

Richardson Monday broke down the committee’s reasons for rejecting the proposals in four parts:

4 The companies were required to include at least five references with contacts for collection and disposal contracts the companies has with cities with populations similar to or larger than Vicksburg’s.

“We recommend you reject the proposal for Metro Service Group Inc. because they did not provide at least five contracts with similar size or large cities. They only provided information for three collection contracts,” Richardson said.

4 The companies were asked to provide a five-year balance sheet and information on the company’s financial stability.

Richardson said the committee recommended rejecting the proposals of Arrow Disposal, Team Waste and Riverbend Disposal because they did not submit the five-year balance sheet.

4 Companies were asked to provide a customer count and a revised proposal price form to submit proposed prices. The committee recommended rejecting Express Waste for not providing its prices on the revised form, which provided the customer count.

4 Although Waste Pro was the only company to provide all the requested information, Richardson said, “They proposed to dispose of the waste at either Riverbend or Waste Management transfer stations. We do not have all the information on either of those disposal sites. We recommend that you reject all proposals and re-advertise.”

After the board’s vote, a representative for one of the companies submitting proposals attempted to discuss the committee’s decision, but Flaggs cut him off, telling him he could talk to him or Aldermen Michael Mayfield or Willis Thompson, or any of the committee members.

“I don’t think we should have some public discussion because of the sensitivity of the information,” he said, adding, “As far as I’m concerned, I will talk to anybody between now and the 10th.”

Flaggs said he also intended to talk with the committee about its decision.