HANAPEPE — When the gates to the monthly The Salvation Army Adult Rehabilitation Center donation event open at 8 a.m. Friday, there will be more volunteers than the usual crew at the Kaua‘i Resource Center at the Lihu‘e Transfer Station on Ahukini Road near Lihu‘e Airport.
“We have nine people this time,” said David Chung, the ARC team leader and a graduate of the ARC program. “We had a reunion of our ARC graduates, especially the Kaua‘i people and families. This was supposed to happen a long time ago, but with the pandemic things kept getting pushed back.”
The Salvation Army ARC Majors Ron and Ronalee Fenrich took advantage of the reunion to visit Kaua‘i for the first time since taking charge of the ARC outreach ministry in 2019, just a few weeks before the novel coronavirus arrived in Hawai‘i.
“Every donation saves a life,” said Ronalee Fenrich.
During the monthly donation event, residents, businesses and others can bring in unwanted or unneeded items for reuse. This includes clothing, small furniture, children’s toys, books and shoes. Clothing and textiles do not need to be in good condition. Torn or stained clothing is OK.
Also, because of the heavy equipment in the area as well as to reduce the chance of injury to customers unloading heavy items, The Salvation Army requests that people remain in their vehicles and let the crews unload the items.
“The last stop for any
donation is the dump where, on O‘ahu, everything is incinerated,” Ronalee Fenrich said. “We are fortunate in that we have a fabric dealer who buys fabric, packs them, and ships them to overseas markets. Our four retail outlets move everything. And we also have people who sell at the swap meets. They’ll call and request special packages like maybe infants. Our people go through and make up packages based on these requests. They’ll also make up a mystery package that gets thrown in. Nothing goes to waste.”
She said once the basic utility bills are taken care of, all of the proceeds go back into the ARC program. Funds from this go to paying for employees, many of whom are graduates of the program.
Items not acceptable at the monthly donations include eWaste, chemicals, appliances and broken items. The county Department of Public Works Solid Waste Division encourages people to check with their local thrift stores to see if they are capable of taking donations before bringing items to the KRC.
Jeff Iida of the Kaua‘i ReStore at Kaua‘i Habitat for Humanity in Hanapepe said there was an instance when the ReStore received a sizable contribution of donated material that he shared with the ARC after consolidating items from the local Salvation Army thrift stores and adding the ReStore contribution.
“What are we going to do with all that?” Iida asked. “We can only use so much. We can’t just sit on it and let it pile up for a couple of years.”
Keola Aki of the county DPW Solid Waste Division said each month’s collection diverts about 14 tons of material from Kaua‘i’s landfill.
“Our usual collection is two containers holding about seven tons apiece,” Aki said. “There are exceptional months when we ship three containers.”
The Salvation Army ARC monthly donation event continues until 3 p.m. Friday.
