From the City of Raleigh E-Newsgram:
CITY EFFORT FOCUSING ON ABANDONED SHOPPING CARTS GOING SMOOTHLY
In the fall of 2007, the Raleigh City Council approved a program to keep Raleigh’s streets clean by removing abandoned grocery carts and returning them to the owner. The City of Raleigh and the North Carolina Retail Merchants Association agreed to a memorandum of understanding in December of 2007 that required retailers to place a placard on the cart with the name, address and phone number of the store.
Six months into the implementation of the effort, the program is in full operation and appears to be working well. To date, the City of Raleigh Solid Waste Services Department has collected approximately 175 shopping carts. In most cases, the carts were found near the stores and the carts were easily returned. The City has designated a space at the City of Raleigh Yard Waste Center for unclaimed shopping carts. Only a few carts have been placed there and most of those were badly damaged or missing a placard. The City has reached an agreement with a local company to recycle the unclaimed carts.