The opening of ReStore will save valuable space in landfills with doors, windows and other goods that can be reused.

SPRINGFIELD - Long Kim Le browsed through a rack of doors, considering how many she might need to replace damaged doors in some of the rental housing she owns.

At $10 used and $15 new, the doors were a bargain, she said. "This is very good," she said. "A new door is expensive" at retail outlets.

The doors are at the ReStore Home Improvement Center, a non-profit venture that aims to give contractors and home remodelers a tax deduction for donations of usable home improvement items, and to give homeowners a break on the cost of buying the materials.

NOTHING GOES TO WASTE John E. Majercak, director of ReStore Home Improvement Center at 250 Albany St., Springfield, is seen through a home window from the store's inventory of surplus and used building materials.

Another beneficiary would be the environment, by finding new uses for valuable items that otherwise might have ended up in a landfill, according to Lauren A. Liss, commissioner of the state Department of Environmental Protection.

"The last thing we want to do is waste the valuable space in our landfills with stuff that can be reused," Liss said yesterday at the ReStore's grand opening.

To help get the venture off the ground, the department made grants totaling $101,500 to the Center for Ecological Technology, a non-profit organization with offices in Pittsfield, Northampton and Springfield.

Located at the rear of 250 Albany St., where landlord Joe Sibilia houses his Gasoline Alley Foundation, the ReStore displayed a folding attic staircase for $35, elbow pipes for the best offer, faucets, long rows of windows and doors, a few pillars and porch fixtures, lamps, and kitchen cabinets, including an 11-piece black cherry set for $2,000.

And while supplies last, every $10 purchase nets the customer a case of Al's coffee cola, free. John E. Majercak, director of waste management programs for the center, said many of the store's donors include contractors who benefit by not having to pay disposal costs and by the tax deduction for the value of the donated items.

Majercak will run the store with AmeriCorps Vista volunteer Jeffrey F. MacFarlane of Hampden. The store will be open Thursdays and Fridays from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturdays from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Donations of merchandise have come from contractors including S.E. Sulenski Roofing and Siding Co., Valley Home Improvement, Wright Builders, John Symanski Materials Handling Service, the Springfield chapter of Habitat for Humanity, and local residents, Majercak said.

The ReStore project is being launched with just under $200,000 in grant money, Majercak said. The goal is to have the store running off its own revenues by the third year of operation.

Majercak said grants have come from the Department of Environmental Protection, $101,500; the Irene E. & George A. Davis Foundation, $20,000; the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, $10,000; the U.S. Department of Commerce's Economic Development Administration, $25,000; the Lawson Valentine Foundation, $40,000; and the Xeric Foundation, $3,500.

Other support for the ReStore is coming from the Homebuilders Association of Western Massachusetts, the local chapter of the National Association of the Remodeling Industry, Goodwill Industries, Hampden-Hampshire Housing Partnership, and Springfield's Department of Public Works and Housing and Planning Departments.

Back to Press