School System Waste - Nice Tax Dollars in Trash

[Mr. Silver Stash]

I drove by a school with a big dumpster out front. There was a lot a decent desks, chairs, a table, janitor buckets etc just thrown in. The item I would have like to grab, which was on top, was buried a few hours later by the time I could try for it. What a waste! Are you telling me the school could not find some way to resell these items, or at least, donate them to a local organization or repurpose them? Crazy. At the very least, let me take that awesome science class lab table! - HH, Jonathan

 

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[Nickleanddime]

Yeah I found a bunch of the metal paper cans they use, all brand new!! I think like other local gov they get a allowance per year for certain items. So they try and use it up since they lose it at the end of the new year. Like where I use to live they would chip and seal the road every year, called the township about it because of the tar on our cars. They said that they are giving a allowance and if they didnt use it they would lose the money then the next year during budget dividing they wouldn't get as much. So schools have the same thing, don't use the budget, budget gets cut. It's like a jobs per dieum if the boss sees you blowing half only on your living expenses then he's going to cut you back.

 

[billjustbill]

Disposable items, things with a lifespan of less than 5 years, do get thrown away. These days, most of the custodial and maintenance staff will have gone through it first.... What quality you saw is a rarity around these parts...


In Texas, by law, new items of Capital Outlay that has a lifespan of 5 years or more have to go out for public pricing or public bids. By the same token, furniture, computers, and maintenance or educational equipment that passed its worth because of high repair cost or damage have to be sold by public bid or auction. There is a nation wide public auction website where you can get automatic daily updates of your state and any neighboring states for schools, universities, and even cities to put things up for sale.

Public Surplus: Government Surplus Auctions

Chances of finding a lab table, shop workbench, or other high dollar items beside a dumpster are almost zero around here.

I had to laugh out loud as I wrote the first paragraph. I remembered what one maintenance worker told me about what some of his friends did while setting up for one of the public auctions. By asking the I.T. department's members as they brought them in, some of the computers still worked, but most didn't. When the computers were put out on folding tables, the maintenance workers took masking tape and on the ones that still worked, they wrote words like "Burned out", "Shorted Monitor", and "Doesn't Work". On the Saturday morning of the pubic auction, the same workers were front and center to bid for those marked computers and got them for almost nothing....

 

[jeff of pa]

hmm I typed in beer where it ask's about looking for a specific item
and it Brought up 1 lot of Metal Detectors, among other items



I guess No beer

& no Ganja

 

[austin]

I used to literally hurt when I would see the things that we would throw away. Books, desks, old file cabinets, old trophys, one time drawers full of WWII ROTC pics from our school, just everything you can imagine. I had the same question, but it went unanswered...

 

[tamrock]

I go to a flea market and in one booth I asked the fella where he got all his old audio and scientific stuff and he said he combs through the schools and other educational institutions dumpsters and goes to their auctions. He'll find very cool old lab equipment and many other valuble items. I think I need to start looking at those places. He had one time a very valuable microscope made ziess optics. I looked it up and it was worth 500 bucks. I didn't get it though, I guess I should have.

 

[Produce Guy]

Here in Austin,TX. ,the state has a warehouse where they sell to the public,it has all kinds of older furniture, desks,bookcases,& all kinds of chairs.The stuff has some really good prices on'em.