Carteret County, NC Trash & Recycling: Yard Waste Collection (2026)

Carteret County Code Chapter 14 treats yard waste, defined in Sec. 14-3 as vegetative matter from landscaping maintenance such as leaves, pine straw, pine cones, grass trimmings and limbs, as a restricted-disposal material. Sec. 14-27 lists leaf and yard waste among items barred from disposal in the landfill or at the transfer station for deposit into the landfill, item (11) on a 30-item list that also excludes hazardous, infectious and radioactive waste. Residents in the unincorporated area cannot drop yard debris at the general landfill face.

Instead, Sec. 14-28 directs the county to operate convenience and recycling container sites where leaf and yard waste is one of six specially accepted materials, alongside white goods, tires off the rims, woody construction and demolition debris, waste oil and lead acid batteries. The sites at Otway, Hibbs Road and Highway 58 carry an explicit exception to the general rule that container sites are not intended for large quantities of accumulated or stored materials, so bigger brush and yard-debris loads route through those three locations.

Property owners fund the system through the annual solid waste availability fee billed with county property taxes under Sec. 14-58 and Sec. 14-59. The solid waste director oversees site operations and can require removal of unacceptable material at the generator's expense under Sec. 14-25. Violations, including improper dumping of yard waste outside the designated sites, are enforced by the county and any agency with health, solid waste or law enforcement duties under Sec. 14-4, backed by the civil penalty schedule in Sec. 14-5.