How to get rid of a mattress in Highland, IL.

Companies that come to your home and carry the mattress out, so you need no vehicle. The prices below are starting prices unless stated — stairs, box springs and extra items add to them.

Most charities will not take a used mattress. These are the ones we checked, including the ones that say no.

• The Salvation Army (satruck.org): accepted-items list includes 'Mattresses' and beds; also says local ordinances and need vary by location and to call 1-800-SA-TRUCK to confirm what a local center accepts. Source
• Doesn’t take mattresses. Habitat for Humanity national ReStore guide: 'Mattresses and box springs are not accepted.' Source

Policies vary by branch. Call before you carry one over — we asked each of the big three directly: Goodwill, the Salvation Army and Habitat for Humanity.

What we established about this city in particular — including where it runs nothing of its own and residents have to look elsewhere.

• Highland's April 2024 service change is where the four-free-bulk-collections figure comes from, and it also ended unlimited curbside trash. The City's announcement, "City of Highland Trash and Recycle Changes Take Effect April 1", states that "Most Trash Collection is Now Curbside", that residents must use Republic Services carts - trash carts with a black lid, recycling carts with a blue lid - instead of placing unlimited trash out for pickup, and that recycling is collected biweekly on published A and B week schedules. On large items it states that residents receive "4 free bulk collections per year", to be arranged by contacting Republic Services customer service at 618-656-6883. It also warns residents to review the Trash Route Map because collection days changed for some addresses. No fee is published for a fifth bulk collection, and mattresses are not named in this document - they are named on the city's Service Desk page instead. Source Not confirmed: No price is published for a bulk collection beyond the four free ones, and no item count per collection is given. Not confirmed: The document does not reconcile the four-collections allowance with the Service Desk page's statement that bulky items need no advance notice.
• Highland's code makes furniture part of ordinary household refuse, which is the legal footing for taking a mattress at the curb. Chapter 58 of the Code of Ordinances, Sec. 58-7(a), defines "Residential unit and noncontainerized business refuse" as "meaning tin cans, bottles, glass, papers, rags, cold ashes only (hot ashes not included), furniture, appliances and all other waste and discard that is generated from within a normal household", expressly excluding "dead animals, sewerage and residue from the construction, remodeling of or razing of buildings and auto parts". The same section defines a "Refuse sticker" as "a sticker or label issued and distributed to vendor sites by city's contractor that are intended to be affixed to certain refuse by the customer to qualify such refuse for collection" - the mechanism the city has now dropped for bulky household items. Sec. 58-1(a) requires each household to maintain "a separate container or bag for garbage and refuse, except landscape waste, of no larger size than 33 gallons of no greater weight than 50 pounds". Sec. 58-4 provides that "No garbage, refuse or landscape waste of any kind shall be allowed to accumulate in or be deposited in any street, alley or public way", that none "shall be placed so that it can be blown about or scattered by the wind", and that none may "be deposited in any other person's container or receptacle without express permission from that person". Sec. 58-6 makes it unlawful for a non-contract hauler to collect refuse the city has contracted for, and requires any other collector operating in the city to notify the city manager's office within seven days. Sec. 58-8 provides that "any person violating the provisions of this chapter shall be punishable as set forth in section 1-13". Source Not confirmed: Section 1-13, which carries the fine range for a Chapter 58 violation, could not be reached on Municode; the amount is not established. Not confirmed: The chapter contains no bulky-item or large-item section, so the no-sticker bulky rule is administrative policy rather than ordinance.
• Highland runs no drop-off site for large items. Neither the Residential Trash Service page nor the Service Desk page names a city yard, transfer station, compost site, convenience center or residents' drop-off day, and the only self-haul option the city offers for anything bulky is a Republic Services temporary dumpster ordered at 618-656-6883 with "4 business day notice", serviced Monday through Friday and billed directly by the hauler. Since mattresses are collected at the curb without a sticker, the city has no reason to run a drop-off and does not; a resident who would rather haul a mattress themselves is directed to no municipal facility, and Madison County operates no landfill, transfer station or bulky-waste site of its own. Source Not confirmed: No dumpster price is published on the city page; the city says Republic bills temporary dumpsters directly.

• Residential body says Saturday 8–2; same-page footer says 9–1. Both show weekdays 8–4. No Saturday schedule selected. Source
• Locator retains Landfill 33 Saturday 7 a.m.–11 p.m. exactly as printed; implausible closing time requires confirmation. Two Columbus District Office cards are distinct OH and IN addresses, not duplicates. Source
• Illinois EPA recycling page offers a 'Beyond The Bin' ArcGIS map of recycling locations, an Earth911 ZIP locator and the Recycle Coach app (statewide partnership since 2025). No mattress stewardship program mentioned. No statewide mattress stewardship program or landfill ban found on Illinois EPA pages as of 2026-09-22; mattress disposal is handled by local governments. Source
• There is no state mattress recycling program in Illinois, and the absence is worth stating plainly because the four states that have one give residents free drop-off. The Mattress Recycling Council, which runs the Bye Bye Mattress collection network, lists its programs on its own Programs page as operating in California, Connecticut, Oregon and Rhode Island. Illinois is not among them. Three things follow for an Illinois resident: no recycling fee is charged on an Illinois mattress sale, there is no MRC-funded free drop-off anywhere in the state, and nothing obliges a retailer, hauler or municipality to recycle a mattress rather than landfill it. Recycling in Illinois is therefore a private arrangement wherever it exists at all — the drop-offs and recyclers listed on this page are businesses and charities choosing to do it, not a program a resident is entitled to. Source