Bonner County disposal sites offer great free finds

Some folks in North Idaho are taking the old ‘trash to treasure’ adage literally. Especially on Sundays. The solid waste disposal sites in Bonner County each have a table where workers place castaway items they think deserve a second life. Anyone—whether they’re residents of the county or not—can stop by the dumps and take from the tables. No questions asked. No charge. The best items come in on Sundays, after the weekends’ garage sales are over, says Colburn site attendant Rebecca Reed. “Some people dump a lot of good stuff,” she says. “There are a lot of people out here who can’t (afford to) go to the Salvation Army or Goodwill to buy things. This does a lot of good.” Reed says people would be amazed to see what gets thrown away, especially by vacationers who rent lake houses for the summer, stock the homes with furniture and household items in June, then toss everything by the end of August—only to repeat the process the following summer. “We’re a throw-away society,” she says. Just as common are families who pick through their parents’ estates after a death, keeping what’s important and throwing away the rest. The most common items on the free table in Colburn are clothes, blankets, shoes and school supplies. Some of Reed’s more valuable finds over the years include an emerald ring, a large oak entertainment system, television sets and an antique gun. “If you know antiques, you could probably find some good stuff,” she says. Not everything that seems to have value gets put on the tables, though. There are some items site attendants leave in the trash for safety reasons, including baby products “in case they’ve been recalled,” Reed says. That’s part of the reason why the solid waste disposal sites in Spokane County don’t have free tables. Local and state ordinances prohibit it, except, ironically, in the case of some household hazardous waste products. Paint, for example, is put on a re-use table for people to take as long as they sign a waiver acknowledging that they’re using it at their own risk. Reed often pulls aside items for people who she knows are in need and can’t drive themselves to the disposal sites. Some visitors come to the dump often to check the table, including a woman who rides her bicycle to the Colburn site once a day and a man in his 20s who stops twice a day, before and after work. “He takes what he can use and leaves what he doesn’t need,” Reed says. “Some people are coming because they need stuff. Others are just wondering what’s there.”