Hemet, CA Trash & Recycling: Mandatory Organics Recycling (2026)

California Senate Bill 1383 (signed 2016) requires every jurisdiction to provide organic-waste collection to all residential and commercial generators, and requires generators to subscribe to and properly sort organics. Hemet implements this through franchise hauler CR&R: residents add kitchen food scraps to their existing green organics (yard-waste) cart. The City defines two organics streams — Food Scraps ("all peels, nuts, seeds, meat, and shells," including rotting food, but no plastic wrappers) and Green Waste ("all plant debris and landscaping waste," excluding plastic/paper bags, hoses, metal, hazardous waste, glass, or material that does not grow from the earth). Residents can pick up a free kitchen food-scrap pail at the City Corporation Yard (3777 Industrial Avenue), collect scraps in the pail, then empty them into the green organics cart for curbside collection. SB 1383's business rules phase in by tier: Tier One generators (supermarkets, grocery stores, food service providers, food distributors, wholesale food vendors) since January 1, 2022; Tier Two (restaurants, hotels, health facilities, large venues/events, state agencies, local education agencies) since January 1, 2024 — these must arrange organics recycling or donate edible food. Importantly, the SB 1383 rural exemption applies only to jurisdictions with a population under 70,000; Hemet's 2020 Census population of 89,833 is well above that, so the City is NOT rural-exempt and organics collection is mandatory citywide. Contact CR&R at 800-755-8112.