Franklin County, NC Water Use Rules: Recycled Water Rules (2026)

Franklin County Code § 34-128 sets mandatory watering-day and watering-hour restrictions for outdoor irrigation countywide, but § 34-128(g)(1) carves out an exemption: the watering restrictions do not apply to properties using nonpotable or reuse water for landscape irrigation. In practical terms, a property irrigating from a reuse or nonpotable source is not bound by the odd/even-address watering-day schedule or the midnight-to-10 a.m. and evening watering windows that otherwise govern spray irrigation, hose-end sprinklers and handheld hoses under § 34-128(b). The same subsection also exempts commercial containerized plant stock maintained for resale and short supervised system checks, and separately lets a property owner obtain a 45-day new-landscaping establishment permit from the public utilities department for irrigating newly installed plantings.

The reuse-water exemption exists alongside, not instead of, the county's general enforcement scheme: violating the underlying watering restrictions (for a property that does not qualify for the reuse exemption) still triggers the escalating penalties in § 34-128(h), a written warning followed by $200.00, then $500.00 civil fines, and ultimately a water service interruption for repeat violations, with unpaid fines within 30 days themselves triggering a cutoff. The ordinance does not otherwise regulate recycled or reclaimed water infrastructure, treatment or distribution; it addresses reuse water only in this exemption for irrigation.