Bridgeport, CT Business Licensing & Operations: Secondhand Dealers (2026)

Bridgeport defines the trade broadly: a junk dealer is anyone trading in junk, old metals, scrap, rags, waste paper, or other secondhand articles as a business. The license runs on a fixed calendar. It is issued annually as of October first, and the fee is three hundred and fifty dollars ($350.00) each year, payable to the city through an application made to the chief of police.

The code builds two disqualifiers into the application itself. No license issues where there is a violation of zoning ordinances, so the dealer's yard must comply with zoning before the chief of police will act. And no license issues where taxes and fees are in arrears, which turns each October renewal into an annual checkpoint on the dealer's standing with the city.

Recordkeeping obligations follow the license. A dealer must log every seller's photo identification, name, and address along with a description of the goods received, must file weekly sworn transaction statements with the chief of police, and must hold goods at least five days after filing before moving them on. That hold keeps recently acquired merchandise on hand and traceable while the sworn statements covering it are on file.