With the recent economic hardships affecting Americans everywhere, it makes sense that there should be a renewed national impulse towards thriftiness. And what is more thrifty than a localized recycling of goods? For the seller, yard sales offer a low-overhead, non-taxable income source. For the buyer, they are the perfect way to pick up everyday household consumer products at bargain basement prices. And for the environment, yard sales provide a means of saving the landfills and reducing the heavy, fossil-fuel laden footprint of global manufacturing and shipping.

Nevertheless, the skeptic can’t help wondering: do we as Americans really have it in our national spirit to spend our holiday weekends cruising the land for used mattresses and old stereo equipment? Will the easy consumption of big box stores prevail, endlessly spewing out more Chinese-manufactured cheap plastic goods, destined for the landfill in less than three years’ time? In my home state of New Hampshire, I took to the back roads on a sunny Memorial Day afternoon to investigate.

“Nobody’s around”, said Tim Baker of Albany, New Hampshire. “The parking lots are empty. If people don’t travel, money doesn’t flow.” As we chatted, a man approached with a large plastic wall clock bearing the logo for Schlitz beer. He liked the clock, but didn’t have enough cash with him to pay the twenty dollar asking price. “How much you got?” Tim asked. “Twelve dollars? Fine. It’s yours. Hey, you interested in this garage tent?”

Just a little way up the road in North Conway, Bob and Jackie Goode had several tables of items set up on their driveway. Jackie offered a more nuanced analysis of the market: “It’s been hit or miss… There are some low bids, but then other folks will come along and pay the price.” Jackie said they held a yard sale twice a year, each spring and fall. Were yard sales going out of fashion? “Not in this day and age!” Jackie responded. As proof of the flourishing yard sale economy, she pointed to the success of internet sites like eBay and Craig’s List.

The couple’s children had all moved out, so yard sales made practical sense as a means to downsize the family clutter. But it was also clear that Jackie loved the thrill of the bargain hunt. “These days, people are digging for good deals. If you keep looking, you can find anything. See that hat?” She gestured to a friend wearing a handsome leather cowboy hat. “I found that for three dollars at the flea market in Old Orchard Beach last weekend – three dollars!”, she told me proudly.

Others, I soon discovered, see the yard sale business as a sheer philanthropic necessity. Later that afternoon, I followed signs advertising a “Huge Lawn Sale” down a dead-end street with cracked pavement. I parked my truck in front of a driveway packed with dusty piles of children’s clothes, boxes of books, and tables of electronic goods. A man with a far-away look in his eyes and an impressive tattoo of a Scottish coat-of-arms on his neck greeted me.

“Do you need a stroller or any baby clothes?” he asked. He didn’t wait for a response, but kept right on talking in soft, slightly resigned mono-tone statements. I don’t think he was being rude or impatient – it just seemed that he could tell at a glance that I probably wasn’t going to take any of the junk he had neatly arrayed around him.

The weekend had been pretty good, he said. “This has been my first lawn sale in two years, and I got plenty of stuff to get rid of.” In fact, most of the stuff he would give away, for free. He just wanted to make sure that it got used. Times were hard and he knew there were people who couldn’t afford things. He began to point out various items he had saved: Four baby strollers, a walker, a couple of boxes of Christmas decorations.

Ron, as he eventually introduced himself, just couldn’t stand throwing away items that were still useful. As a last resort, he would take things to the thrift store at the local dump, but they often charged him 5 dollars to leave a working refrigerator or lawn mower. “How about that?” he asked. “Having to pay somebody else to take your stuff…” He shook his head sadly.

In all, Ron said that he had probably made around forty dollars that weekend. But financial success was a secondary concern. Ron had two rented storage units filled with more stuff that he was going to clean out that week. If he didn’t get rid of the stuff in his garage this weekend, he would have no place to put the new junk coming in from the storage units.

“I just don’t understand it… I’m willing to give this stuff away, and people still won’t take it.” His voice drifted off. I stood there in silence with him for a few moments, then took my leave. The drive home took me past the local Wal-Mart, and I couldn’t help noticing that the parking lot was full, bustling with eager Memorial Day shoppers.

One thing’s for certain: the yard sale economy has plenty of room to grow.

Originally published on the Huffington Post on June 6th, 2008.

The cost of home heating oil has increased 80 percent in the last year, and many rural communities are in dire economic shape already. There’s a real possibility that low income families will not be able to afford enough oil to last them through the coldest months, and will have to choose between food, medicine, or a warm home.

Right now there’s no relying on the federal government. For 2009, the White House slashed the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program’s budget by 22 percent, to 1.9 billion dollars. Although a cadre of New England senators have introduced bills to more than double LIHEAP’s funding, additional support is far from assured. On Friday, Senator Judd Gregg proposed legislation that would provide an additional 2.5 billion dollars to LIHEAP, as well as funding for weatherization and home energy tax credits for the middle class. The effort promptly stalled on Saturday when the Senate voted against moving to consider the bill.

Expect to hear a lot more from Washington on this important issue — but the Congressional debate is far removed from the front line communities that are struggling to prepare for what may well be nothing short of a small-scale humanitarian crisis. Locally, town officers and state representatives are beginning to meet with charitable foundations, non-profits organizations, local church groups and home heating professionals. They’re planning public forums, organizing fundraisers, and discussing how to best allocate money. And they have a staggering amount of work to do.

At one such meeting, held in a local fire station, twenty community leaders gathered in a conference room just behind two bright ladder trucks that sparkled in the cool darkness of the station garage. The back door was propped open to facilitate airflow in the muggy July weather, and many in attendance sipped cold soft drinks, but an icy reality undercut the gathering.

The town manager spoke first. She said, by way of introduction, that the town currently has a 1,500 dollar contingency fund for heating aid — about enough money to provide 3 households with 100 gallons of heating oil each. Next, a representative from the county-wide Community Action Programs, the organization that distributes LIHEAP funds, reported to the group. She said that they had already begun to process applications for assistance in a bare bones, women-and-children-first fashion. Those deemed “most vulnerable” — the elderly, the disabled, and those with children under the age of five — could apply for aid now. After September 1st, the gates will be opened to all other households that qualify according to the low income guidelines. But the CAP won’t know until December 1st how much money they actually have to distribute from LIHEAP, leading to considerable concern about enabling people to expect support before the money is secure.

Most of the meeting centered around coordinating local organizations to raise and distribute money as a safety net for those who LIHEAP has to turn away, or who use up their assistance money and still need additional help. It seemed that there were more questions then answers. Would the Rotary Club be willing to act as a clearing house for money raised through donations and fundraisers? Would the funding be limited to residents of the town, or available to the entire county? What about needy families who live just across the border in Maine? Would the money be designated strictly for heating aid, or could it also be used to help buy food? Somebody mentioned that in the nearby village of Sandwich, the three town selectmen had each contributed 500 dollars to create ad-hoc emergency heating fund. As soon as money is taken out of the fund to help a needy member of the community, a new donor is approached to make a contribution, thereby always maintaining a 1,500 balance. Another person asked if town land could be made available to provide free firewood to those who need it. After all, dry hardwood is being advertised on the front page of the local paper for 300 dollars a cord — that itself is a record high price.

The last comment reminded me that despite the dark circumstances currently facing many Americans in the northern US, heating crises are nothing new in this part of the world. As the meeting continued, it struck me that this is what New Englanders have done for hundreds of years — come together town by town, under one roof, to figure out how they will make it through another winter. And in the end, regardless of Congressional stalling or the generosity of Hugo Chavez, that may be what gets us through the winter of 2009.

Originally published on the Huffington Post on July 27th, 2008.