Yonkers, NY Trash & Recycling: Recycling Requirements (2026)

Yonkers City Code § 92-4, enacted under Chapter 92, Recycling, requires every residential waste generator, meaning anyone whose waste comes from household functions such as cooking or cleaning, including owners or managers of buildings with three or more units, to separate 'residential recyclable material' from household waste at the point and time it is generated; that duty began September 1, 1992. Section 92-3 defines residential recyclable material to include newsprint, non-wax-coated corrugated cardboard, clear or colored glass food and beverage containers, steel, aluminum or bimetal food and beverage containers, bulk metal fixtures and appliances, food and beverage plastics, yard waste (leaves, small branches, twigs and brush), lead-acid vehicular batteries, motor oil, and commingled metals, plastic and glass.

Residents must put out separated recyclables and trash for removal under the Commissioner of Public Works' rules, or deliver them directly to a transfer, storage or processing site; motor oil must go to a service station required to take it, and used vehicular batteries to a retailer or scrap facility required to accept them for recycling. Section 92-7 lets a waste generator who cannot comply apply for an exemption, but that application goes to the Westchester County Commissioner of Environmental Facilities, not the City. Scavenging someone else's set-out recyclables is separately banned under § 92-11.