The Dallas sanitation fee is about to stop being one price. Starting Feb. 1, 2027, homes with alley pickup will pay $45.22 a month and homes with curbside pickup will pay $37.76, replacing the single $40.09 rate that every residential customer pays now. The split is part of the fee and rate changes tied to the city’s FY2026-27 budget, which the City Council adopted Sept. 16.
For an alley household, that is $5.13 more each month. For a curbside household, it is $2.33 less. The difference between the two is $7.46 a month, or $89.52 a year, based on Never Late News calculations from the city’s approved rate table.
The sanitation change is the one most Dallas homes will notice, but it is not the only one. The same package raises the stormwater drainage charge, more than doubles the residential 9-1-1 fee per line and changes dozens of fire, ambulance and animal shelter fees. Here is what is changing and when.
Why the Dallas sanitation fee is splitting in two
Dallas Sanitation says the tiered rate will “better align customer rates with the cost of providing each service type.” In plain terms, the city says alley collection costs more, and right now curbside customers help pay for it. The city says the new structure will “reduce the alley-related costs currently included in rates paid by approximately 160,000 curbside customers.”
The city serves about 260,000 sanitation customers. Its curb transition page says about 36% are on alley collection and 64% are at the curb.
Here is how the residential rate changes, using the city’s figures:
- Current rate, alley or curb, through Jan. 31, 2027: $40.09 a month
- Curbside rate from Feb. 1, 2027: $37.76 a month, down $2.33, or 5.8%
- Alley rate from Feb. 1, 2027: $45.22 a month, up $5.13, or 12.8%
Over a full year, a curbside household saves $27.96 and an alley household pays $61.56 more, by our math.
The city also raises the charge for an additional garbage cart from $15.51 to $16.29 a month. Packout service, where crews collect carts from the home, goes from $138.38 to $145.30 a month.
About 6,000 homes are moving from alley to curb
A separate change affects some alley customers directly. Dallas Sanitation says about 200 alley blocks, or roughly 6,000 homes, will move to curbside service starting Feb. 1, 2027. The city says those alleys are too narrow or have dirt, gravel or badly broken pavement that is not safe or efficient for trucks.
That group is about 2% of customers. The plan is much smaller than earlier versions. According to the city, the original 2024 plan would have moved all alley customers to the curb, and a 2025 revision would have affected about 10% of customers. The current plan covers about 2%.
Affected homes will get a mailed notice. The city says the collection day does not change, and carts should be at the curb by 7 a.m. Free cart assistance is available for residents who cannot move carts because of a disability and have no one in the household who can help.
The city’s FAQ also makes clear that paying the alley rate does not guarantee alley service forever. Alley pickup still depends on safe access, which Sanitation reviews regularly.
Stormwater and 9-1-1 charges rise too
The stormwater drainage charge, based on a property’s impervious area such as roofs and driveways, goes up in every residential tier. The city’s fee attachment lists:
- Up to 2,000 square feet: $5.39 to $5.79 a month
- 2,001 to 3,500 square feet: $8.59 to $9.23
- 3,501 to 5,500 square feet: $12.84 to $13.80
- More than 5,500 square feet: $21.01 to $22.59
Each tier rises by about 7.5%. For nonresidential property, the charge per 1,000 square feet goes from $2.90 to $3.12, with the monthly minimum rising from $8.29 to $8.91.
The residential 9-1-1 fee rises from 62 cents to $1.30 per line, per month. That is 68 cents more, an increase of about 110%. Over a year, one line goes from $7.44 to $15.60. The memo says the 9-1-1 rates are used to reimburse the Dallas Police Department and Dallas Fire-Rescue.
Put together for a curbside home in the 2,001 to 3,500 square foot stormwater tier, starting in February: sanitation falls $2.33, stormwater rises 64 cents, and one 9-1-1 line rises 68 cents. That is about $1.01 a month less. The same home with alley service would pay about $6.45 a month more.
Fire, ambulance and animal shelter fees
The package also changes fees many residents only see in an emergency:
- Treatment by Dallas Fire-Rescue when a person is not taken by ambulance: $125 to $295
- Ambulance fee: $1,473 to $1,575
- Each loaded mile of ambulance transport: $10 to $9
- A Dallas Fire-Rescue false alarm fee: $530, up from no charge
Some animal fees go down. Dog adoption falls from $45 to $20 and cat adoption from $15 to $10. Registration for a dog declared dangerous rises from $252 to $500, and for an aggressive dog from $201 to $500.
The fee to inspect and test a backflow device rises from $165 to $220.
Why the city says it needs the money
In a Sept. 3 memo to the council, Chief Financial Officer Jack Ireland said the changes follow a city policy that requires an annual review of fees to see how much of each service’s cost they recover. He estimated the package would bring in:
- General Fund: $3,895,660
- Dallas Water Utilities: $5,855,257
- Storm Drainage Management: $6,793,049
- Sanitation: $5,053,613
- 9-1-1 System Operations: $3,566,173
The Mixed Income Housing Development Bonus Fund is projected to lose $5,890. By our count, the total is about $25.2 million. The memo said that revenue was already built into the balanced budget and warned, “If this agenda item fails, the budget will be out of balance.”
That budget is the same one that cut the Dallas property tax rate to 69.78 cents. Fees like these are separate from the tax bill, and from the two property tax measures on this fall’s ballot: the Dallas County Prop A homelessness tax and the city’s $443 million public safety bond.
Two notes on the city’s documents. The memo’s sanitation line labels the current $40.09 rate as running “Through January 31, 2026,” and the sanitation page’s column header says “beginning Oct 1, 2027.” Both appear to be typos: the page’s own footnote says fee changes took effect Oct. 1, 2026, except residential sanitation, which starts Feb. 1, 2027.
How Never Late News reported this
This report is based on these public records:
- City of Dallas memo on agenda item 26-2932A, fee and rate adjustments in the FY 2026-27 budget, dated Sept. 3, 2026, with the full fee attachment
- Dallas Sanitation FY 2026-27 approved rate changes, the city’s rate table and footnotes
- Dallas Sanitation curb transition page, with customer counts, the alley-to-curb plan and its revisions
The dollar and percentage changes, annual amounts, sample household totals and the $25.2 million revenue total are Never Late News calculations from those records. No interviews were conducted for this report. To report an error, email editor@neverlatenews.com.