Novi, MI Trash & Recycling: Recycling Rules (2026)

Once the city's designated hauler begins service under the contract authorized by Section 16-76, Section 16-63(b) requires yard waste, leaves, grass clippings, garden debris, shrubbery and brush under four feet long and two inches thick, to be either composted or disposed of on site without creating a nuisance, or placed at the curb or another designated spot for the hauler under the council's published collection rules. Landscaping companies may still remove yard waste themselves, but Section 16-63(b) obligates them to compost it, deliver it directly to the city's hauler, or take it to a lawful disposal site outside Novi; they cannot simply dump it.

Section 16-63(c) governs ownership and scavenging: any recyclable material set out for collection becomes the waste hauler's property the moment it hits the curb or designated pickup spot, and it is a violation of Chapter 16, Article IV for anyone else, an unauthorized collector or a passerby, to pick it up. Section 16-64 backs this with a separate rule that no one may dispose of solid waste or recyclables generated at a Novi residence except through the designated hauler under contract with the city. Together these sections keep the recycling stream, and its resale value, inside the city's contracted program rather than open to informal collection.

The Department of Public Works and the city's contracted hauler run day-to-day recycling operations, while enforcement of unauthorized collection falls to Community Development's code enforcement officers and the Novi Police Department.