How to get rid of a mattress in Wilkes-Barre, PA.

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.

• Outside that once-a-year run, Wilkes-Barre City's regular trash will not take the item. The city's Garbage page lists what crews leave behind - "The items will NOT be collected:" ashes, stone, rugs, dirt, bricks, tires, construction materials, appliances, and furniture - so a mattress has no weekly route. Regular household trash runs on a pay-per-bag sticker system adopted by City Council on February 9, 2023, replacing the large blue bags: a large sticker is "$2.00/sticker (no minimum quantity)" for a bag up to 30 pounds, small blue bags are "$6.25 for 5-pack ($1.25/bag)" up to 15 pounds and need no sticker, and stickers "should be visible to DPW crews, therefore they should face the street." Garbage must be at the curb by 7:00 AM from Labor Day through Memorial Day and by 6:00 AM from Memorial Day through Labor Day, on a five-day neighborhood schedule: Monday Downtown and South Wilkes-Barre 1; Tuesday North End, Heights and Brookside; Wednesday Mayflower, Rolling Mill Hill, Iron Triangle and Goose Island; Thursday South Wilkes-Barre 2; Friday East End, Parsons and Miners Mills. Garbage service covers single-family homes, duplexes and apartment buildings with fewer than four apartments. Questions about the sticker program go to the Mayor's Office at 570-208-4158. Source
• Wilkes-Barre City prices the mistake directly. Its Quality of Life Ordinance fine schedule, which the city marks "current as of 3/1/18", lets a code officer ticket a household like a parking ticket, and three of the twenty-nine offenses reach a mattress left at the curb in the wrong week: § 19(3)(14) "Outside Placement of Indoor Items", $100.00; § 19(3)(10) "Improper Disposal of Trash/Rubbish", $100.00; and § 19(3)(15) "Ownership Presumption of Waste,Trash &/or Recyclables; Illegal Dumping", $100.00. Related entries are § 19(3)(8) "Accumulation of Rubbish/Garbage" at $100.00, § 19(3)(12) "Littering or Scattering Rubbish" at $100.00 and § 19(3)(18) "Storage Containers for Waste/Trash" at $100.00. The schedule shows a payment period of 48 hours against every offense, while the page's own text says fines must be paid within 10 days. Source Not confirmed: The fine schedule is marked current as of March 1, 2018 and the city does not publish a later one, so the 2026 amounts are not confirmed. Not confirmed: The page contradicts itself on the payment window - 48 hours in the table against every offense, 10 days in the surrounding text - and the full ordinance text is a separate linked document.

• Operator location page gives 219 Street Road, West Grove PA 19390; DEP permit 101069 directory gives 261 Street Road. Preserve both; no automatic address overwrite or branch merge. Source
• Seven facility cards distinguish YCRRC/Small Load Drop-Off at 2651 Blackbridge Road from management at 2700, recycling at 2685 Blackthorne Court, ash site, recreation and sanitary landfill. Operator ZIP 17406 differs from DEP YCRRC ZIP 17402. Source
• No statewide mattress stewardship program or landfill ban found on PA DEP pages as of 2026-09-22; mattress disposal is handled by local governments. Source
• PA DEP County Recycling Coordinators directory (select county) for local drop-offs and events; RecycleSearch for material-specific facilities; DEP Recycling Hotline 800-346-4242. DEP says bulky items go through your refuse hauler, or your county recycling coordinator if you have none. Source