Published: August 21, 2008 10:10 am      

Theft, dumping escalate at Salvation Army Thrift Store

CLINTON — Employees of the Clinton Salvation Army Thrift Store, 405 Seventh Ave. South, are asking area residents to respect the store and its purpose by not dumping items or taking items from outside the store.

Store Manager Diana Harrison said the store always has had problems with people leaving large amounts of things along the West wall of the store after hours and thefts of merchandise from the front of the building. Harrison said that recently, it has become more of a problem than ever.

“We’ve always had a problem, but lately its been really bad,” said Harrison.

She advised the store is happy to receive good quality items from clothing to furniture to knick knacks and what-have-you, but said some people are taking advantage of the store and treating the side of the building like a dump site. She said store employees often have found garbage bags, severely damaged items or other clutter people should be taking to the city dump instead.

“We’re open seven days a week to take donations,” Harrison said. “We even started opening up the truck and taking donations from 12 to 4 on Sunday, so there’s no reason for people to just dump that stuff.”

Store personnel are asking residents only to drop donations off during regular business hours from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

She said people ransack bags of clothing looking for something they may want during the evening hours and leave a big mess for store employees to clean up the next day.

“We love good quality donations, but if they leave it out there it just gets stolen or destroyed,” said Harrison.

She added that people have gone so far as to crawl inside the drop bins along the west wall to rifle through the bags. Harrison said taking items either placed for sale outside the building or donated to the store is theft.

“Items alongside of the store or in front of the store are not free. If they take it, it’s stealing,” she said.

Harrison said approximately one month ago, she was driving past the store while it was closed and two people were loading a couch into a large black truck. She said one person claimed to have purchased the couch and was picking it up, but as store manager and having worked the last few days, she knew better.

“I know people are really hurting more this year with the costs of everything going up, but the money from the sales goes to help those in need,” said Harrison. “If they just come in and ask, we have no problem helping them afford something they need, even if they can’t afford much but maybe a small donation.”

Items received by donation are taken to the Davenport processing site for repair, cleaning or other preparation work to ready the items for resale.