DRAFT -- Neighborhood Swap: A Toolkit for Community Collaboration
Published by:
Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association
1200 W. 26th St, Suite 127,
Minneapolis, Minnesota 55405
October 2012
Funding for this project was provided by Hennepin County through Community POWER: Partners on Waste Education and Reduction
About the Author:Rebecca Harnik was hired as Environmental Coordinator at LHENA to implement the Community POWER grant. A graduate of Macalester College, Rebecca previously worked at the nonprofit Eureka Recycling, supporting composting and Zero Waste initiatives at restaurants, events, and the Mill City Farmers Market. Subsequently, as Program Coordinator at the local nonprofit Gardening Matters, she worked to develop the Compostadores, a bike-powered initiative to strengthen community garden sustainability. Rebecca received her Master Recycler/Composter certification in 2012, helping to organize a pilot Fix-It Clinic in Hennepin County for community members to teach and learn skills for fixing broken items.
Table of Contents
Background:
Executive Summary:......
Background: Why Swap?......
LHENA’s Swap Outreach......
How LHENA’s Neighborhood Swap Unfolded:......
What Attendees brought
Planning for A Swap......
Taking it further: Broadening the conversation......
Background:
The Neighborhood Swap was funded by the Rethink Recycling Grant for Community POWER (Partners on Waste Education and Reduction) in 2011-2012.
Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association – known as LHENA – received the grant to promote recycling and composting activities in Lowry Hill East, also known as The Wedge Neighborhood, through environmentally-focused workshops, events, newspaper articles, and outreach throughout the year. While LHENA examined these issues, The Neighborhood Swap emerged as a concept to reduce waste generated in the late spring – historically noted as a time when Spring Cleaning and move-out time for renters produce a great deal of waste. While other neighborhoods have done Clean Sweeps or Green Sweeps to promote recycling, this particular event was geared towards sharing and reusing items before they need to be recycled.
This toolkit is a guide for other neighborhoods or community groups to replicate our work in their own unique contexts.
Executive Summary:
Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association’s first-ever Neighborhood Swap took place on the weekend of May 19th in local Mueller Park, from 10 am to 4 pm. The entire Wedge neighborhood (the neighborhood served by Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association) community was invited; whether attendees wanted to get rid of items they no longer used, to simply browse, or to take home “new” items to use as their own.
The Swap drew nearly 100 community members on May 19th, despite the 90+ degree heat. The second day of the swap had to be canceled, due to poor weather, and leftover items were delivered to Salvation Army. Over 1,200 lbs of donations were swapped or donated, eliminating a significant quantity of waste from the landfill, and enabling community members to offer new life to local resources and reconsider items that may have formerly been considered “trash”.
A banner created for The Swap in Mueller Park
Background: Why Swap?
Have you ever been on a college campus around move-out time? It’s a dumpster diver’s wildest dream, and an anti-materialist’s most horrendous nightmare. May is a month with a lot of perfectly good stuff left on the curb or in the dumpsters as residents move, feeling frenzied and burdened by their own belongings. For some, a Neighborhood Swap is an opportunity for residents to get rid of their stuff without throwing it away and creating waste. And for others, it’s a great opportunity to save money and get a great deal on useful new possessions.
“New,” in the used sense.
The implications of swapping:
it’s not just about saving money
In recent decades, the swap movement has experienced resurgence amid those frustrated by the materials economy. Many are recognizing the detrimental impacts of affluenza – affluence + influenza, known as the “highly contagious epidemic” of overload, debt and waste resulting from consumerism – and swapping has come forth as a way to preempt cycles of buying, obsolescence and disposal. Online sites such as Craigslist and Twin Cities Free Cycle have emerged as successful outlets for sharing and bartering.
A successful swap can have a major impact. In 2008, in Southeast Minneapolis, The Southeast Como Improvement Association organized a Move-in/Move-out (MIMO) event that was replicated subsequently for 3 years, geared primarily towards students at the University of Minnesota. SECIA’S annualevent in total diverted 26,000 lbs of household waste back into usage. Many of SECIA’s planning and outreach techniques were utilized by LHENA in our event’s planning
LHENA’s Swap Outreach
Ensuring that participants have a strong understanding of the swap is critical to the success of the event, and maximizing outreach before the event is an important way to do so.
LHENA flyered a 2-3 block radius of Mueller park, where the event was hosted, to build as much support as possible from neighbors, and to encourage participants to bring items ahead of time and prepare their donations before Saturday. Neighbors were supportive of the event – though contact info was listed, no neighbors voiced concerns. Approximately 15 businesses in the neighborhood also received fliers to display.
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DRAFT -- Neighborhood Swap: A Toolkit for Community Collaboration
Accepting materials:
LHENA created an extensive master list of acceptable materials to ensure that attendees were well-informed about swappable items ahead of time, and that volunteers would be able to enforce proper donations. Broken electronics were not permitted for the event – The City of Minneapolis strongly discouraged accepting electronics because of the fear of being deluged in materials, as happened at an event in Bloomington last year. Electronics are only acceptable if a city truck is hired to go to individual households to pick up the electronics (costs $96/hr) because it can be more tightly regulated. Electronics presented a challenge to volunteers about acceptability because it is very difficult to know the working order of electronics. Ultimately, volunteers stopped accepting electronics because of these concerns.
Exceptions were made for “unacceptable” donations in which neighbors promised to take back their items if nobody else took them (only happened twice – once with an old sink, and once with a motorized weed-whacker – both neighbors eventually had to take back the items).
How LHENA’s Neighborhood Swap Unfolded:
The LHENA Neighborhood Swap was held in Mueller Park, which is owned by the Minneapolis Parks board, for a two-day weekend in late-May. Because the Wedge neighborhood consists of 85% rental units, many of whom are students,we found that the end of May is a good time for the neighborhood. (The Wedge has historically seen a great deal of waste come forth from move-outs as items are tossed on the curb, from students and other renters.)
LHENA decided to test the Swap over one weekend, with pickups available Friday, and swapping taking place on Saturday and Sunday. Unfortunately, our event was rained out on Sunday, so the event only lasted one full day. LHENA donated all leftovers to the Salvation Army. This partnership was organized ahead of time, and a drop-off was coordinated so that they could be the planned recipients of the Neighborhood Swap.
Mueller Park, a centrally located site in our neighborhood, is our largest neighborhood green space, and has strong visibility on Bryant Ave, a bike boulevard. Though we considered an indoor event, we thought it important to be outdoors, for recruitment, accessibility, and to be in a centrally located point in the neighborhood. The park was affordable and relatively easy to work with – the full weekend rental was $50. There were several stipulations, including that all materials had to be cleared out of the park overnight, but the location was mostly flexible.
Three days before the start of the event, LHENA created a large banner and hung it in the park to notify neighbors of the Neighborhood Swap. The banner was created on a shoestring budget, utilizing a neighborhood banner and buying vinyl lettering from a nearby office supplies store.
LHENA chose to “stock” the event ahead of time so that attendees would be able to browse items on Saturday morning as the event started. LHENA collaborated with local non-profit Steeple People to have donations of extra furniture and other items donated. The ahead-of-time pickups were also helpful for ensuring a significant amount of materials at the start of the event. For those unable to transport possessions to the park during the event, LHENA ran a free U-haul service to do pick-ups from neighbors on the day before of the event, coordinated through an online google form.
The event was free for all attendees; no monetary transactions were involved for participants. Swappers were permitted to donate without taking, or take without leaving items behind. Drop-offs in Mueller Park were accepted beginning at 8am on Saturday morning as setup began, even though the event didn’t start until 10. Swappers came and went throughout the day, with relatively high turnover of items. The flow ebbed after approximately 1pm, as the day grew hotter, approaching 90 degrees.
Items were not permitted to be left in the part overnight, per Park Board rules. After considering different storage options for the items between Friday pickups and the close of the event, Saturday and Sunday, a U-Haul was determined as the ideal storage unit overnight for the items. The U-Haul was also used for pickups on Friday, deliveries of larger items to households during the eventto participants if they didn’t have means to take items home during the event.
Finally, the U-haul was useful for taking non-claimed items to Salvation Army after the completion of the event. A medium-sized U-haul was found to be worthwhile, as it had a ramp to facilitate easier loading.
Staff and Volunteers:
Staff time and resources were funded through the Community POWER (Partners on Waste Education and Recycling) grant through Rethink Recycling, with one .25FTE staff person to prepare for the event, with available support of the LHENA Neighborhood Coordinator.
A total of nine volunteers were recruited for the event, and one to two LHENA staff persons were on-site at all times to educate volunteers and collect liability forms. A neighborhood Green Team was organized in 2012, which helped support the planning of the event, as well as flier and volunteer. Shifts lasted three hours for each volunteer. Because the second day was cancelled, three volunteers did not end up participating in the event.
Several event volunteers were members of the LHENA Environmental Committee – a very helpful asset to have when planning for the Swap. The Environmental Committee held meetings and discussed planning logistics, resources needed, and offered time and resources throughout the event.
Our Budget:
This was our budget:
What Attendees brought
(and took Home):
A total of 1,253 lbs of materials were brought to the Neighborhood Swap and either claimed by neighbors or taken to the Salvation Army.
Items swapped included:
Baby clothes · winter jackets · adult clothing · purses · mens’ ties · sunglasses · toys · an adult bicycle and trailer · shoes · a bedframe · jewelery · games · shelves · tables · art · books · sheet music · CDs/DVDs · VHS movies · cassette tapes · coffeepots · blenders · toaster ovens · cooking materials · cutlery · a clock · a baby crib · a rug · wicker chairs · pots/pans/ baking materials · a giant container of un-popped popping corn · lamps · roller skates · hockey skates, etc.
Planning for A SwapTaking it further: Broadening the conversation
Swapping is a great opportunity to tie ideas into the big picture of waste reduction and planned obsolescence – it’s not just “free stuff!”
Think about building the dialogue about waste, facilitating future materials sharing, and equipping residents with waste reduction opportunities or resources.
Ideas to Build the movement:
- Generate Buzz
Post information online ahead of time, on facebook, e-democracy, social media or your organization’s website. Link to other local groups to spread the word. Encourage attendees to post ahead of time on facebook or e-forums about items they are bringing or might be hoping to find.
- Promote Knowledge
Include a broad spectrum of waste reduction resources: Bring an expert on site to the event, such as a Master Recycler/Composter, County Representative, or another person with detailed information available. Master Recyclers, for example, have received comprehensive training on waste reduction and make a 30-hour volunteering commitment. Other environmentally focused groups or non-profits may want to have a table at the event.
- Develop leadership
Hand out fliers for neighborhood meetings, discussions, or events and collect info for those interested in continuing dialogue or participating in neighborhood committees, such as a Green Team.
- Continue the discussion
LHENA didn’t collect contact voluntary contact information from attendees, but would do so next time -- this is an important way to maintain conversation after the event, to allow for continued dialogue, volunteer recruitment, surveys, and to keep community members informed about future waste reduction events and opportunities.
Additional Resources:
Southeast Como Improvement Association (SECIA):
Story of Stuff:
Rethink Recycling:
For Additional Information:
The Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association can be reached at .
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