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The trash hauling company whose billing led to months of controversy this summer has been awarded a new three-year contract.

At Wednesday's meeting, city council voted 4-3 to keep Nickolich Sanitation of Clairton as McKeesport's trash collection service. In addition, Nickolich also will begin collecting the city's recyclables.

Councilors Darryl Segina, A.J. Tedesco Jr. and Fawn Walker-Montgomery voted against the contract.

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At $80.21 per ton for the first year of the contract, Nickolich's quote was the lowest of four companies that bid on the contract. Other bids were $108.60 per ton from Big's Sanitation of Rostraver Township, $109.20 from Waste Management of North Huntingdon Township and $120 from Greenridge Waste Services of Scottdale, Westmoreland County.

Recycling is currently collected by two public-works department employees. Nickolich bid $50,000 to collect recycling as part of the garbage contract. Other bids for recycling collection were $48,600 from Big's, $128,520 from Waste Management and $217,872 from Greenridge.

Earlier this month, Nickolich also won a contract to collect trash in Rostraver Township, according to the Valley Independent, though Rostraver commissioners cited the McKeesport controversy as the reason for awarding Nickolich an agreement for one year instead of three.

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Nickolich has been collecting the city's trash since 2009 --- with apparently no public complaints until February, when an anonymous letter was sent to McKeesport officials, claiming that the company was billing the city for trash collected in other municipalities. Nickolich bills the city by the ton; since the company took over the contract, the amount of tonnage for which the city has been billed has increased about 20 percent.

In the midst of a five-way race for the Democratic nomination for mayor, the accusations --- strongly and categorically denied by Nickolich --- set off months of arguments.

City Controller Ray Malinchak, a candidate for mayor in the November election, paid for his own investigation of Nickolich. Malinchak has not made that investigation public, though in September he announced that it revealed "systematic" overcharging, along with other evidence of wrong-doing that he said he turned over to federal and state law enforcement agencies.

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Walker-Montgomery questioned why city council never followed through with its own promised investigation. "We all voted to have a report done, investigating the tonnage," she said. "I don't feel that I can vote on this, because I don't feel like I ever got all of the information."

Tedesco agreed: "We voted to conduct an investigation and we failed to do it."

But Council President Mike Cherepko said he sent certified letters to seven different firms asking them to bid on an investigation of the trash hauling contract. All seven declined.

Cherepko questioned why --- if Malinchak's investigation really turned up wrong-doing --- the controller didn't make it public. "If I were Mr. Malinchak, nothing would have made me happier than to slap that report down in everyone's face," Cherepko said.

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The decision to award the recycling contract to Nickolich was the reason for his "no" vote, Segina said.

The city's recycling program is "absolutely horrible," Segina said. "Do we really want to put more money into this program? There are people in this town who don't have recycling bins. There are people in this town who don't have recycling schedules. I think we need to hold off on this."

Every ton of recyclable material that goes into the trash increases the city's waste hauling bill, while providing no income, Segina said. "We're spending $180,000 right now for our recycling program, and our revenue from recycling is $6,000," he said.

The two employees currently detailed to recycling would be better utilized in the street department, which is currently short-handed, Cherepko said. "We're getting ready to go into winter right now, and that's the last place I want to be short," he said.

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