City · County · State
Who to call about what.
Half the frustration of dealing with local government is not knowing whose problem it is. This page is the switchboard.
Start here
City or county?
Columbia sits inside Marion County and the two are separate governments. Roughly:
The city — water and sewer, household garbage, city streets, police, fire, permits, zoning inside the city limits. 201 Second Street · 601.736.8201.
The county — county roads and bridges, drainage, solid waste outside the city limits, the tax rolls, the sheriff, and the courts. Courthouse on Broad Street.
When in doubt, call City Hall. If it isn't theirs they will tell you whose it is, which beats working through four websites.
The one everybody asks
Garbage pickup is the city's.
If you live inside the city limits, the City of Columbia collects your household garbage. There is no separate sanitation bill and no separate office — the can, the deposit and the monthly charge all sit on your water and sewer account at City Hall, 601.736.8201.
The can
- The city provides one can per household, and the deposit for it is made at the Water Department alongside the water-sewer deposit.
- The deposit is a deposit, not a purchase. This is the part that catches people, and it is an easy thing to misread. You are putting money down for the service, the same as you do for water.
- Need a second can? Make another deposit at the Water Department, and you will be billed for both.
- The cans belong to the city. When the billing account closes, every can the city provided stays with the city — the same way the water meter does. You can no more take the trash can with you than the meter on the side of the house.
On collection day
- Everything on the regular route must be household, non-hazardous waste, securely tied in appropriate trash bags.
- Have the can at the roadside no later than 6 AM.
Which day is yours
The city runs five collection days, Monday through Friday, and they are drawn as areas on the city's paper route map — not as simple north-of-this, south-of-that lines. That map is on this page, just below, published here with the city's permission. Broadly, from that map: Monday the north of town, Tuesday the west side toward the river, Wednesday a large area to the north-east, Thursday the south along Highway 98, and Friday the south-east out past Highway 98.
Monday and Thursday are split by Church Street. North of Church Street is Monday; south of it is Thursday. Church Street itself is collected on Monday.
⚠️ The rest is our reading of the city's own route map. The five days are drawn on it by hand as rough areas, not as street-by-street boundaries, so it cannot tell you which side of every street falls where. Call 601.736.8201 and ask for your day before you plan around it. The City Clerk's office is putting together the streets collected on each day, and when that list is ready this page gets a clearer map drawn from it. If what you are told does not match this, tell us — that correction helps the next person, and we would rather be told than keep it wrong.
Limbs, clippings, and the things the truck will not take
The regular route is household trash only. Everything else, the city will still come and get — you just have to ask for it.
- Vegetative debris — limbs, grass clippings, leaves.
- Other non-hazardous items — the bulky things that were never going to fit in a can.
- Ask for those two separately. What it is decides which truck gets sent, so saying which one you have saves a wasted trip.
- There is no charge for either, as things stand today.
🔴 One exception, and it is the one that causes arguments. If the pile was made by somebody you hired — a lawn service, a tree cutter, a contractor — hauling it off is part of their job, not the city's, and it is not supposed to be left in your yard. Worth settling in the quote before the work starts.
All of it starts at 601.736.8201.
Outside the city limits, garbage is the county's — Marion County Solid Waste, 601-736-6466 · 217 Broad Street · Solid Waste Manager Joey Alford. Private haulers also serve the area for roll-offs and commercial dumpsters.
Corrected August 2026. An earlier version of this page said garbage was a county service everywhere. Inside the city limits, it is not — the city runs the route. Source: the City Clerk's office. Something still wrong?
The city's own sheet
The garbage route map.
This is the map the route runs off. The City Clerk's office scanned it and gave us permission to put it here, so you no longer have to come to City Hall to look at it. The city is working on a street-by-street list of which day each street is collected; a cleaner map will replace this sheet once that list exists.
Drag to move · pinch or scroll to zoom · zoom in to read the street names
Where each day is written on the sheet
- Monday — “Mon”, written in the middle of town, north of Church Street.
- Tuesday — “Tue”, on the left, the west side toward the Pearl River.
- Wednesday — “Wedday”, top right, the north-east.
- Thursday — “Thur”, along the bottom, the south along Highway 98.
- Friday — “Fri”, on the right, the east side.
The printed colours are land use, not collection days. This is the city's land-use plan with the days added on top in marker. The yellow, red, blue and purple blocks are houses, shops and industry. “Area 1” to “Area 5” in red are proposed annexation areas — they are not collection areas, and they have nothing to do with your bin day.
Source: the City of Columbia's own route sheet, scanned and sent by the City Clerk's office, 18 August 2026, and published here with the city's permission, 25 August 2026. The base plan is “Existing Land Use”, Slaughter & Associates, field survey 2017 and 2019, updated 16 August 2021. Download the original scan (PDF, both sheets).
⚠️ The days are drawn by hand as rough areas, not street by street. This viewer shows you the city's sheet — it does not work out your day for you, because the sheet cannot settle which side of every street falls where. If your house sits near one of the lines, call City Hall on 601.736.8201 and ask for your day. If what you are told does not match this map, tell us.
Limbs, clippings and bulky items
Ask the city to come and get it.
The regular route is household trash only — but the city will come and collect the rest, at no charge, if you ask. Tell us which kind it is and we will send the right truck the first time.
🔴 One exception: if the pile was made by somebody you hired — a lawn service, a tree cutter, a contractor — hauling it off is part of their job, not the city's. Worth settling in the quote before the work starts.
Prefer to talk to a person? 601.736.8201.
Elections
Voter registration and elections.
Marion County Election Commission — (601) 736-8246. Registration, polling places, absentee voting and precincts. The Circuit Clerk keeps the voter roll.
⚠️ Your polling place can change depending on the election. A county or state election and a city-only election do not always vote at the same locations. Always confirm before election day.
Law, courts and records
Police, sheriff and the courts.
Emergencies — 911.
Columbia Police Department — 601.736.8204. 201 Second Street, the same building as City Hall. Chief Adrian Fortenberry. City limits.
That number answers with a menu, so here is what the buttons actually do:
| Press | You get |
|---|---|
| 0 | Dispatch — to report something. The one most people want. |
| 1 | Administrative office |
| 2 | An investigator |
| 3 | Municipal court |
| 4 | The jail |
| 9 | Emergency — though 911 is faster |
Press 0 when something needs reporting but nobody is in danger. Suspicious behavior on your street, noise late at night, cars racing, a cat up a tree — that is dispatch, and it is exactly what they are there for. You are not bothering anyone.
If somebody could get hurt, hang up and dial 911. Do not work through a menu during an emergency.
Columbia Fire Department — 801 Pearl Street · 601.736.4556. Emergencies still 911.
Civil Defense — Courthouse Square · 601.736.9627. Storm and emergency preparedness.
Marion County Sheriff — 601-736-5051, after hours 601-731-3780. County-wide, outside the city limits.
Chancery Clerk — Elisha Moree — 601-736-2691 · 250 Broad Street, Suite 2. Land records, deeds and estates. (601-444-0206 is the fax, not a phone.)
Circuit Clerk — Janette Nolan — 601-736-8246 · 250 Broad Street, Suite 1. Court records, juries and the voter roll.
Marion County Board of Supervisors — 601-736-7382 · 215 Broad Street. County roads, bridges and drainage.
Coroner — 601-731-2429 or 601-731-2788. Constables — 601-736-2572 or 601-736-2580.
Municipal Court — City Hall · 601-736-4418.
Property, animals and nuisances
Code enforcement, permits and cemetery plots.
Carrie Thornhill — Interim City Inspector · 601.736.8201 · cthornhill@cityofcolumbiams.com
The City Inspector's office handles:
- Building inspections and code enforcement — the same person and the same City Hall number for overgrown lots, derelict structures, junk vehicles, nuisance complaints, and building inspections
- Gas permits
- Cemetery plots — this is a city function, not the county's. Start here for a plot or a burial record.
Business and privilege licenses are handled separately by the Deputy City Clerk's office, not by the City Inspector. Call 601.736.8201 and ask for business licenses.
Animal control — call the city-issued cell at 769-204-9339 inside the city limits, or the Sheriff, 601-736-5051 in the county. The old landline does not reach a working phone. A dangerous animal or a bite is 911 — do not wait for an office to open.
Work
Jobs and hiring.
WIN Job Center — 601.736.2628. Free to job seekers and free to employers; the first call for anyone hiring or looking locally.
Marion County Development Partnership posts openings from member businesses — job postings · 601.736.6385.
City and county positions are posted at City Hall and the courthouse. The county keeps a page for local openings.
Starting something instead of joining something? The business page has the whole checklist and what each step costs.
Also the city
Four departments people forget exist.
Columbia Public Library — 900 Broad Street · 601.736.1812. Free to use, and the only air-conditioned public room in town where nobody expects you to buy anything.
Street Department — Department head Brandon Turnage · City Hall · 601.736.8201. Potholes, street signs, drainage and right-of-way inside the city limits. County roads, county bridges and county drainage belong to the Board of Supervisors instead — and that line catches people, because a road can change hands halfway down its length.
Parks, Recreation & Athletics — Interim Director Will Jordan · City Hall · 601.736.8201. Youth leagues and field scheduling; The Yards is where most of it happens — over 700 children played recreational baseball there this year.
Water Department — City Hall · 601.736.8201. Start or stop service, ask about a bill, confirm current payment options, or sign the separate residential or commercial water user agreement. Your garbage can deposit is made here too, and the trash charge is billed on the same account.
Accounts Payable — ap@cityofcolumbiams.com, for vendors invoicing the city.
Missing something?
If you called and got the runaround, tell us.
This page exists because knowing who handles a thing is half the work. If a number here is wrong, or you got bounced between offices, let us know which one and we will fix the routing.