Letter: Divert waste with donations

Thank you for the wonderful Earth Day-themed front-page article about the need to spare the landfill, as it is filling up quickly. As Jason Auslander stated, “The biggest source of solid waste is construction and demolition waste.”

At Habitat for Humanity, we’d like to encourage people not to wait for legislation or policy changes to extend the life of our landfills. Everyone can help our community improve sustainability (and build affordable housing simultaneously), as many have already with donations to Habitat‘s ReStores. In the eight years since our ReStores have been in the valley, we’ve already diverted over 1 million pounds of waste from the landfill.

People can join the movement when replacing things like furniture, remodeling or even fully demolishing their homes. For help and advice, call Hector the Collector at 970-618-1666. For those large donations, we have a home demolition and salvage program, and can work with your contractor to help you spare the environment and get you large tax deductions. (For example, we just received a massive donation of amazing furnishings from Peter Guber’s Mandalay Ranch, and these are for sale at our Basalt ReStore.)

Habitat is going to be building a new, consolidated 50,000-square-foot ReStore. After building 22 homes in partnership with local low-income families, we are building our own home. This new ReStore will allow us to accept even more donations and save more materials from the landfill, thus generating more funds to help even more families in need of a hand up.

To build this ReStore we are asking for community support. Please text the word “green” to 27722 to donate $10. Your support (or vote) will help us qualify for large grant and to help us all maintain our beautiful community.

Scott Gilbert

President, Habitat for Humanity Roaring Fork