Portland, ME Trash & Recycling: Illegal Dumping (2026)

Section 12-23(a) of Chapter 12 bans throwing or depositing garbage, tobacco product waste, yard waste, solid waste, prohibited waste or any other waste matter, or causing it to be thrown or deposited, on any street, sidewalk, alley, gutter, park or other public way, or on any premises, vacant lot or in any water. The only lawful place for such material is a suitable container required under the article or a litter basket the city has supplied, and even city litter baskets can't be used to dump large volumes of solid waste.

00 per offense, on top of attorney's fees, costs and the cost of properly disposing of whatever was illegally dumped; that figure was reaffirmed in the chapter's most recent amendment, Ordinance No. 220-25/26, effective June 1, 2026. Section 12-23(b) exempts this violation from the notice-and-cure procedures in Sections 12-27 and 12-28 that apply elsewhere in the article, meaning enforcement can move straight to the offense charge without a prior warning period. Enforcement runs through Section 12-27: the chief of police handles violations tied to city streets and public property, while the chief of police and the building authority jointly enforce the private-property side, with authority to pursue civil or criminal action through the corporation counsel.

Because Section 12-23 stands apart from the escalating $100/$200/$300 ladder in Section 12-30, every dumping offense in a Portland street, park or vacant lot carries the same $200 charge regardless of whether it's a first or repeat violation.