DeKalb County, GA Trash & Recycling: Holiday Pickup Schedule (2026)

The DeKalb County Code does not mention holidays anywhere in Chapter 22. Section 22-30(b)(1) sets the baseline, saying refuse will be collected twice each week from residential units, and the Public Works Department's Sanitation Division publishes the holiday calendar that tells residents how that service moves. This page quotes that calendar, titled "2026 Residential Holiday Collection Schedule." It covers the unincorporated county customers the Sanitation Division serves. A resident of a city that runs its own trash service follows that city's calendar, since section 22-30(a) lets municipalities and licensed commercial sanitation firms collect refuse too.

The printed calendar has three kinds of outcome. On New Year's Day (Thursday, Jan. 1, 2026), Thanksgiving (Thursday, Nov. 26, 2026) there is no service, and Thursday customers are serviced on Friday. On Martin Luther King Jr. Day (Jan. 19), Presidents Day (Feb. 16), Memorial Day (May 25) and Labor Day (Sept. 7) there is no service on that Monday and collection runs one day late for all customers. On Veterans Day (Wednesday, Nov. 11) collection runs one day late for Wednesday and Thursday customers only. Juneteenth (Friday, June 19), Independence Day (observed Friday, July 3) and Christmas Day (Friday, Dec. 25) carry no change in collection service.

The calendar lists Friday, Nov. 27, 2026 alongside Thanksgiving in its observed column, but the only shift it prints is Thursday customers moving to Friday. No New Year's Day 2027 date appears on the 2026 calendar, so nothing is posted for Friday, Jan. 1, 2027 yet. The calendar does print a Christmas tree collection window of December 28, 2026, through January 7, 2027, and it warns that the collection schedule may change due to inclement weather. The county's Collection Procedures page adds that suspended weather collections resume the next scheduled business day, and that carts must be out by 7:00 AM on collection day.