Throwing good books into the dumpster
You've got to wonder how often this happens. A school or library throwing perfectly good books into the trash:Several garbage bags filled with copies of classic literature like "Little Women," "Sarah, Plain and Tall" and "Treasure Island" were discarded in a Dumpster alongside Intermediate School 73 in Maspeth.I've seen this happen at a regional public library near my house. Either these books should be given away or sold, or there will be a lot more dumpster-diving.
"Those books, you open them up, they still crack, they're so new," one staffer said. "Why not give them away or hold a book drive at least?"
Labels: library sales
posted by Steve Weber at 3/15/2008
5 Comments:
That is just insane. While I fully understand weeding your collection, because that is something that all librarians do, that is for books that are outdated, old, or just plain bad. That is most definitely not for new books.
By the way, it is much easier to give the books away than to sell them. The rules and/or laws for this are particularly stringent in most states.
The recycle center in my town has bins full of good books all the time.
I've rescued an uncountable number of fantastic books, especially children's books, but also out-of-print hardcover non-fiction adult books that have decent value.
And I've also filled the bins with books I cannot sell or give away, when I decide it's better to let them be recycled into new paper than to fill a landfill or take up needed space in my warehouse.
The policy there used to be that people were welcome to take any books they wanted. They also freely allowed people to take clean cardboard boxes, interesting glass from the glass bins, magazines, etc.
Within the past month, for some reason, they've changed the policy and have no-pilfering signs all over the place.
It's very sad.
As a bookseller I'd love to have access to look through these discarded books. But if that's not possible, then I'd like to spread the word about sites like Freecycle or 2good2toss. Whole boxes of unneeded books can be offered for free on these sites. Homeschoolers, day care centers, homeless shelters, hospital reading programs, senior centers, etc. can benefit from these books. Better that than to end up in a landfill.
Disgraceful. Even if they did not want to sell the books (which is dubious; perhaps the money raised could go back into the classroom -- and still more people could benefit financially from the books...let alone readers who would have had hours of enjoyment) - they could have donated it to one of the many charities, either through a group like Bookmooch, or direct. In fact many of the charities on Bookmooch are schools (including one in NYC) that desperately need books!
Someone on that list pointed out that a children's hospital could have greatly benefited from such a gift. Imagine if all the kids in a ward could forget their pain and troubles for a second and all share the same story.
Close to a decade ago, when I still worked in higher ed, my office donated books and software to a nearby high school. It's not that unusual. If there's a policy against it, you can always write and ask for an exception. What a waste of the taxpayer's money, and of wonderful books that could spur more kids to read!
Thrift stores probably put more books into dumpsters than any other group. The ones I go to throw boxes of books away quite often, especially if they are getting lots of other donations. I encouraged one thrift store not to do that. . .they received some bookstore shelves in a donation and allocated a good sized space to books and they now get lots of customers they didn't get before. I don't see it as competition, but as a chance to keep those books out of the dumpster. I have found that talking to the thrift store managers/board of directors about their policies helps. Thanks so much Steve for these photos. Publicizing donations and books being thrown away is probably the most effective way we can get it stopped. If a national news service picked up on the story, that would be even better. I have often thought that if people in the community saw their donations being thrown away, that would stop it. . .or if the community saw library or school dollars being thrown away.
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