Tuscaloosa, AL Trash & Recycling: Recycling Rules (2026)

Tuscaloosa City Code Sec. 16-111 declares that recyclable materials placed at curbside or in city right-of-way for pickup, or deposited in bins or areas the city designates for recycling, become the property of the city, subject only to a narrow carve-out: the depositor may still retrieve items from their own containers at curbside or right-of-way, and from materials placed for trash pickup at their own residence. Everyone else is locked out under Sec. 16-112, which makes it unlawful for any person other than the city or the city's authorized recycling contractor to remove recyclable material once it has been placed at curbside, on city right-of-way, or in a designated bin or area.

The section spells out that scavenging is charged per incident: each location and each day's violation or noncompliance is a separate and distinct offense, so a scrapper working multiple bins on the same block, or the same bin on multiple days, can rack up multiple citations rather than one. Sec. 16-113 layers on a companion offense covering damage rather than removal: it is unlawful to burn, break, destroy, scatter, or salvage recyclable materials placed at curbside, in the right-of-way, or in any designated recycling bin or area.

Chapter 16's definitions section (Sec. ) lists what counts as recyclable material for these purposes, including newspapers, aluminum, steel, electronics, white goods (appliances), plastic, and cardboard set out for city or contractor pickup or placed in designated recycling bins. All three sections trace to Ord. No. 7680, Sec. 2, adopted June 7, 2011, and sit in Article IV, Division 1 of Chapter 16 (Municipal Utilities and Services), alongside the city's broader garbage and trash collection scheme run by the department of environmental services.