Old Residence Hall Furniture Impacts Needy New Homes

Furniture from old residence halls at East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania is impacting people in need as the beds, dressers and desks find new homes through local non-profit groups and charity networks. More than 500 dressers, desks, beds and other furniture mostly from the old Hawthorn and Hemlock residence halls has been given away by the university. The two student residence halls were replaced this year by modern apartment-style residences which opened in January as Hawthorn Suites and Hemlock Suites. Other furniture came from residence halls where rooms had temporarily been used as “triples” to house three students and now were returning to “doubles.”

“The old halls are about to be torn down, but much of the furniture in them was still serviceable and has found new purpose,” said David Campbell, associate director of residence life and housing. “We’ve been at it since early February, but the bulk of what we got rid of happened in the last six to eight weeks,”Campbell said. “It has been well worth it, knowing we were able to help some people out.”

Getting rid of surplus furniture is a new experience for ESU. Before the new suites were built, almost every year the university was adding beds and dressers wherever it could to serve a growing student enrollment.

“We’re usually in the market of looking for surplus,”Campbell said. “It’s been a pleasant change, and heartwarming to hear ‘thank you, this is to going to help out a homeless family.’ ”

The university reached out to every local non-profit organization it knew of that might be able to use the furniture, then turned to some national charitable networks.

“Basically, it was first-come, first-served,” Campbell said, noting that once he connected with an organization in need of what ESU had to give, arrangements were made for the group to collect what they could use.

Most of what has been given away is furniture added in recent years as student housing needs increased. The original rooms in the dorms, built in 1965 and 1970, were furnished with built-in loft units: all-in-one pieces with a dresser connected to a desk and a wardrobe, with a bed at the end.

Big and bulky — 6 feet long, 6 feet high, and 3 feet wide — each loft unit has to be taken apart to be moved, and ESU still has 50 of them to give away.

The next step, Campbell said, may be to advertise them on Craig’s List. The university is restricted in how it disposes of material goods, so if no other charitable organizations want the loft units, they may be made available to the general public in exchange for a donation. Here is a list of furniture ESU has donated to charitable organizations:

• 60 beds and mattresses to four Boy Scout camps in the area.

• 55 desk chairs, 10 lounge chairs and eight tables to the Stroudsburg Little League to help furnish its new field house after the previous building was destroyed by an arsonist.

• 50 dressers, 15 desks, 10 wardrobe units and 10 beds went to Twin Pines, a Christian camp and retreat center in Stroudsburg.

• 15 dressers, five wardrobes and a desk to Family Promise of Monroe County, which supports low-income families with food and shelter.

• Six dressers to New Bethany Ministries, which shelters the homeless and mentally challenged in the Lehigh Valley.

• 25 loft units to Keystone Rescue Mission Alliance in Scranton.

• 34 beds and mattresses, three loft units, 12 wardrobes, 22 dressers, 22 desks and 22 desk chairs to a Scranton boarding school.

• 30 beds and 15 mattresses to Equipping The Saints, which provides used and bargain goods to ministries around the world.

• 100 mattresses to Harvest International, which has shipped them to Haiti. The group helps meet the physical needs of the poor.

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