Focusing on building reuse infrastructure in the communities they serve, Finger Lakes ReUse has created workforce development programs, technology repair and education, and partner programs with other organizations鈥攁ll based on the mindset that reuse generates lasting community value.
The roots of Finger Lakes ReUse go back to Tompkins County鈥檚 20-year solid waste management plan that was developed in the 1990s. As one of the early leaders in New York State to invest in progressive materials management, Tompkins County began to develop compost, food waste, and reuse programs. They had included a reuse center as something that they wanted to create because they had adopted recycling and the revenues were stronger than expected, so they had an abundance of funding. As a result, they put out a call for businesses that were already involved in reuse in order to support them.
A building preservation organization called Historic Ithaca had a volunteer-run architectural salvage program that was launched in 1991. In 2001, Finger Lakes ReUse CEO Diane Cohen was hired back then as a program manager through a grant funded by Tompkins County. 鈥淚 entered into this work before it was an industry, and have watched the waste reduction mindset grow, along with recognition of the value and impact of reused materials.鈥� In 2005, Cohen said she was seeing a lot more material outgrowing the original program. 鈥淚 had helped them get into an 11,000 square foot warehouse, but it was still more than they could handle. So, they said, 鈥楲et鈥檚 start planning to develop a reuse center鈥� and asked me to lead the project. For the next two and a half years, myself, Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County, Cornell University, Ithaca College, and Tompkins County worked together to develop our first reuse center.鈥�
Deciding to register as a nonprofit 501C3 independent organization, this public/private partnership has been able to grow as Finger Lakes ReUse takes on the risk and the county is relieved of liability. The operation was named Finger Lakes ReUse because they envisioned becoming a regional operation within New York State. 鈥淲e didn鈥檛 want to call ourselves Tompkins County ReUse because while Tompkins County wanted a reuse center, we didn鈥檛 want it to get confused with government recycling programs. Finger Lakes ReUse鈥檚 name would help distinguish that,鈥� explains Cohen.
Planning began in December 2005 and Finger Lakes ReUse opened its doors to its first Community ReUse Center in a strip mall in November 2008 starting in 7,000 square foot space and immediately expanded, in April 2010 doubling in size into the empty storefront next door, now totaling 13,000 square feet.
They doubled in size in 2015 and opened a second 17,000 square foot Ithaca ReUse Center five miles away. They expanded again in April 2020, adding an additional 17,000 square feet in the original location鈥攔ight at the beginning of COVID. Cohen explains, 鈥淲e took over a hardware store that had closed and left much of their inventory on the shelves, so we negotiated with the mall owners to sell the inventory in exchange for rent and offered them a portion of the proceeds. They agreed and the now 30,000 square foot 鈥楻eUse MegaCenter鈥� was off and running.鈥�
Board of Directors
The Finger Lakes Reuse Board of Directors are fiscally responsible for governance and the financial side of the organization.
- Gideon Stone, President
- Patricia Brown, Vice President
- Paul Mazzarella, Treasurer
- Elizabeth Bodner, Secretary
- Marshall McCormick
- Ray Schlather
- Vicki Taylor Brous
- John Lemley
- Megan McDonald
- Dr. Maria Thomadaki
- JoAnn Cornish
- Lynn Leopold, Board Emerita
- Jan Rhodes Norman, Board Emerita
- Jodie Herbert, Board Emeritus
A Work in Progress
Finger Lakes ReUse started with seven employees, growing to 85 employees today. It serves the 105,000 people in Tompkins County, including 30,000 college students. Cohen stresses that they have evolved as an organization, focusing on not only waste reduction as a primary driver, but also looking at how they can do more to help keep all reusable and repairable materials out of dumpsters and landfills. 鈥淎s we developed our job training program, we have really shifted into recognizing that a powerful benefit of reuse is the opportunity for self-empowerment, skill-building, and community engagement. One of our challenges has been to figure out how to balance the challenge of the cost of labor with the growing volume and variety of the range of materials we collect and manage every day, so we are still a work in progress.鈥�
Finger Lakes ReUse has humble roots. For the four weeks prior to opening the first storefront, Cohen brought on a manager whom she had worked with in her prior job at the architectural salvage program. They would go to garage sales and purchase goods to provide initial inventory and give the public an idea of the range and quality of materials they were expecting to receive as donations at the ReUse Center. 鈥淭he day we opened the doors to the public, we had a line at the register. We had the 7,000 square foot space with items displayed all over, including a large volume of brand-new windows that had been donated to our local Habitat for Humanity who didn鈥檛 have a Restore in our market,鈥� says Cohen. 鈥淲e supplied our large inventory by going to garage sales. This also helped to seed the imagination on what people could donate. I trained our manager to keep our prices at 50 percent or less, to encourage turnover and accessibility.鈥� At the same time, Finger Lakes ReUse opened their donation drop off daily and it has grown ever since. While the organization has done a handful of popular drop off events, they are labor intensive and there are capacity challenges managing the 200 vehicles arriving with donations daily. 鈥淲e get so much that we have been forced to suspend the majority of our pickup service on and off for the last four years because of capacity challenges. We are selling about 2,200 items a day, meaning we鈥檙e putting about 2,400 items per day on the shelves, so it is a lot of processing.鈥�
The top items that Finger Lakes ReUse sees come through are clothes, housewares, and furniture, with housewares being the #1 item and clothes a close second. Computers, electronics, and building materials are a huge growth opportunity鈥攅ven though it is labor intensive, all of it has a high value with a possibility of it being much bigger segments. Cohen stresses that what differentiates Finger Lakes ReUse from traditional thrift stores is that the range and quality of the items accepted is greater than other thrift stores. She explains that they also send out material if there is no market for it or it is more than what they can handle, but their preference is to keep materials in local and regional markets. 鈥淪ometimes material comes at us in such a large volume that we put it on pallets. For example, we鈥檝e sent out 23 tractor trailer loads of unsorted clothing and earned $80,000 on that; we have also sent out nine tractor trailer loads of books last year, but we鈥檇 prefer to keep those materials in local circulation.鈥� Finger Lakes ReUse also works with a partner organization in Reading, PA called Opportunity House. They have sent Finger Lakes Reuse pallets of new-in-the-package, beautiful men鈥檚 dress shirts鈥攊t took the organization a couple of years to sell through those. In turn, they have sent them tractor trailer loads of household goods to sell as a fundraiser for their homeless and veterans鈥� programs.
With two locations, Finger Lakes ReUse accepts donations at both centers. 鈥淲e鈥檝e learned that convenience is key, so we accept a wide array of reusable materials, but we only sell refurbished computers, clothes and books at one location, and sell electronics at both locations. Clothing takes space to process and that鈥檚 why we鈥檙e currently only selling it at one location,鈥� says Cohen. 鈥淲e have refined our ability to put items on the shelves, and it鈥檚 been interesting to see how that impacts the sales and partner relationships.鈥� She points out that Finger Lakes ReUse has several different wholesale/commodities vendors that they work with, developed and nurtured by a particular staff member who started as their first ReUse Center Manager in 2008. While they would prefer to keep items locally, they also do not want tractor trailer loads getting dumped somewhere else, so Cohen says it feels like they are deferring their own waste in a way. 鈥淲e also know that there鈥檚 demand and a need here in our region and the only thing that鈥檚 stopping us from putting those 34 loads on the store shelves is having the internal capacity, so in our current business plan, we are looking to open a third location. We are still considering the best place to put it in our county. Although Goodwill just opened in our market, we believe that we could continue to capitalize in this area and serve a lot more people right here. When we started with the first location, less than five years in, we realized that we had not hit the bottom of the potential donation pile and started looking for another visible location in Tompkins County. We confused our communities because they did not understand why we had 鈥榤oved鈥� and we had to explain to them that we still had the first location,鈥� laughs Cohen. 鈥淪o, we realized how hyper-local reuse is, and we want to continue to get better at doing business while serving this important need.鈥�
Working through Challenges
While donations started spiking in 2018 and 2019 due to rising awareness of plastics in the oceans and the 鈥淕reat Pacific Garbage Patch鈥�, when COVID hit in 2020, it created a tidal wave because people sat at home downsizing clutter. Explains Cohen, 鈥淚t was a crazy surge to manage, and we were forced to grow but we didn鈥檛 have the capital, so it was a really challenging three years. Through community conversations, it was determined that we were clearly an essential business, but to keep our workers safe, we temporarily halted operations and moved to online sales. During the brief shutdown, we furloughed 14 employees and switched over from our original QuickBooks point-of-sale system to a more flexible one, Shopify, where we could have an online sales presence because it was something customers really wanted. We did sales by appointment in June 2020 and in July we got things back up and running. Then, in August we were able to secure a warehouse because we knew that we wouldn鈥檛 really be able to fully absorb what the public was about to bring us unless we had some sort of decompression space. We rented a small warehouse with some help from our county partners and started accepting again, so we were only fully shut down for about eight weeks.鈥�
With Finger Lakes Reuse stabilizing now, they are looking forward again, still using the newer system, and working with various Cornell and Ithaca College teams to keep building the infrastructure, including facility and app design, workforce policies, and business planning. 鈥淚 have learned that with disruption of the global economy, it does create opportunities. Finger Lakes ReUse was born during the last recession and whether it is a good economy or bad economy, people need stuff and are conditioned to look for a good deal. Our stores are crowded no matter what. When Goodwill opened close to us, we didn鈥檛 even really see a dent in our sales, which is amazing. We did experience a slight dip in our donation drop offs but we鈥檙e grateful for that,鈥� says Cohen.
Cohen points out that one major challenge is that reuse still lacks the funding and prioritization given to recycling. As a result, Finger Lakes ReUse has not yet received the necessary investment in infrastructure, which includes warehouses and staff. 鈥淲hat we鈥檝e been trying to do is make the case that the opportunities for workforce development and workforce engagement are profound and effective. We are also building awareness that what we really need is waste authorities and regulators to recognize this as a key waste reduction strategy. The cost of our facilities could be defrayed through public partnership, and we could contractually share the cost. Currently, we are bearing the whole cost with grants, etc. but if that cost of infrastructure is subsidized in some way, that would be an enormous push forward for the reuse industry.鈥� Cohen said that they have a five-year strategic plan that is in draft form right now and they will be talking to their local and regional stakeholders about expansion and the next strategic steps, which is having the overflow managed by working warehouses on a larger manufacturing scale鈥�50,000 to 100,000 square feet.
鈥淲hen you鈥檙e doing strategic planning, you have to identify who your stakeholders are鈥攚hich is everyone who has material鈥攁nd everyone who is impacted by materials management. We do not have the resources to build this on our own, so we鈥檙e talking to potential partners, government, and others to help us look at what the operation would look like depending on the facility. If we can get a manufacturing-scale workforce development facility piloted, and get one or two more reuse centers open in Tompkins County, what kind of revenues would that generate, what number of jobs, what type of sales tax and avoided costs could the government and public benefit from?鈥�
For years, because they were supported by the county, they tracked each item鈥檚 price and weight uniquely, figuring out a price for it as well as an estimated weight through their point-of-sale system. Explains Cohen, 鈥淲e ended up realizing that our items were selling at about a dollar a pound鈥攐r about $2,000 a ton, which far outstrips recycling commodities revenues. With $2.5 million dollars in sales last year, we are estimating that we have diverted 1,200 tons of waste per year and that doesn鈥檛 include what we were able to recycle. We鈥檙e showing that people can directly participate in waste diversion when infrastructure is in place. We need to look at how we collect materials differently.鈥�
鈥淩euse has continuous value in the community. If you can set up this infrastructure, it is constantly generating local economic support and resilience as it provides and gives access to affordable materials, supports poverty relief and keeps quality items in circulation,鈥� stresses Cohen. 鈥淲e all have a role to play! How do you see yourself being able to take a small action to help support the evolution of this industry? If we could focus on this for one year to build up this infrastructure, it will have impacts for generations to come. There is so much more economic opportunity in our dumpsters than anyone recognizes. For example, at the end of every semester, college dumpsters are being filled with laptops, brand new books, and clothing. This is happening across the country, and we want to help demonstrate a system that anybody can replicate, so we are developing ReTAP (a reuse technical assistance program), which is an online business plan template that communities can use to get their reuse infrastructure up and running.鈥�
Workforce Development
Finger Lakes ReUse works with many workforce development partner programs in town, including Challenge Workforce Solutions, an organization that employs people with disabilities. Cohen stresses that Finger Lakes Reuse offers engaging experiences and the opportunities to build skills for careers are numerous and varied鈥攆rom technology to construction and customer service as well as management and leadership. 鈥淭here鈥檚 just an enormous range of things in the reuse arena you could focus on and feel connected to.鈥�
When Finger Lakes ReUse first opened in 2008, there was a community organization that refurbished computers but they lost their free space. In 2010, they ended up offering a lot of electronics as well as some of their volunteers to the organization, so Finger Lakes Reuse opened an eCenter next door to their main facility. Cohen explains, 鈥淲e started refurbishing computers right around the time that New York State banned electronics from going into the landfill, and the tidal wave of stuff was insane. People were storing their CRT monitors and computers in their attics, closets, and basements because it just didn鈥檛 feel right to throw them away. We had grant money for one coordinator and a handful of really wonderful, dedicated volunteers, plus we started working with college students and a professor who wanted his classes to build on this opportunity. I told him we need a mutually beneficial training program and thanks to Ithaca College and this professor, in 2013, we launched the ReSET Job Training Program, where we offer skills and employment training. It continues to be really popular. We ran 14 cohorts until COVID disrupted the program in 2020, but last year, we got a cohort going again and we鈥檙e now creating our second one.鈥�
Those who participate in the ReSET Tech program typically work 20 hours a week for 10 weeks. They come in and learn the basics of computer components, disassemble computers, test the components from the circuit boards for capacity, wipe data, and install new operating systems. The computers are then sold at affordable rates to consumers. The program adheres to the Department of Defense鈥檚 level of need for regulation on data destruction and Finger Lakes ReUse is a licensed Microsoft refurbisher. If the program participants have been demonstrating good attendance, interest, and motivation to learn, they can apply for a full-time paid apprenticeship. 鈥淲e get funding support for 50 percent of their pay from various funding sources, and the other 50 percent is through the sales that they are helping to generate. We can usually bring on one to two apprentices; then, the next cohort starts. During this time, they also get the experience of being a leader. When they鈥檝e been with us for two or three months, they know the ropes, so they can show people around as well as communicate and help teach. It鈥檚 a really fantastic program,鈥� says Cohen. 鈥淲e recently hired a deconstruction coordinator to build relationships with contractors to teach the building industry, so that it can be something in our tool belt to offer as a service, and we can develop another track after the ReSET Tech. Our goal is to offer something that is accessible to people. For example, for a reentry component, if someone is released from incarceration and ready to get to work, we want to help them turn over that new leaf and start a new set of patterns. Our requirement is that they must be paid from day one and we are flexible on the hours. This program has been in place for several years. Through COVID we kept a trainee who had been out of the workforce for 25 years, and he was one of the people we didn鈥檛 furlough because we thought that he was potentially vulnerable enough that it would be disruptive, so we kept him on, and he has since become a manager. We haven鈥檛 been able to solve every problem by any means, but we often say we鈥檒l hold the door open, and you have to walk through. We treat each other with respect, and we鈥檒l help you develop your skills.鈥�
Community Outreach
Finger Lakes ReUse is committed to helping their communities as well, participating in events around the area. Cohen says recently they set up a table at an event called Better Together for Mental Health Month. 鈥淎 former board president and I gave out info for the day. It was just fantastic. We had rare earth magnets that were salvaged out of hard drives as an item of interest to display, and people wanted to buy them, so I told them we sell them in the store if you want to stop by.鈥� Finger Lakes ReUse also has a ReUse Materials Access Program, where they gave out $190,000 in store credit to more than 800 households in need last year. With this program growing in popularity, the organization does get some funding from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and other local partners to support the redistribution of these materials, in partnership with 40 or 50 local human service agencies. 鈥淎 person can鈥檛 come right to us; they must be already working with a social service entity who then fills out an application on their behalf. The executive director of that organization signs a memorandum of understanding and social service workers are eligible to recommend clients for this program. Once approved, the client immediately has store credit in their name at each location. We do limit the program to three laptops a month and one delivery service per year. We are providing a lot of support; we have so much abundance and we are building this infrastructure that we feel like it鈥檚 the right thing to do to share it as best we can.鈥�
A Comprehensive Reuse System
Finger Lakes ReUse is currently drafting its 5-Year Strategic Plan and is looking forward to working with its communities and stakeholders to develop a comprehensive reuse system. This includes large warehouses to accept, sort, assess, process, and repair materials to be kept in local and regional use, converting empty downtown storefronts into vibrant Community ReUse Centers, and reuse being formally recognized as an effective workforce engagement and development activity to help build confidence to take on critical jobs and careers. Cohen says, 鈥淚 would like to build on the growing recognition of the impacts of reuse by helping to demonstrate best practices of what is possible, and how many thousands of lives can be made better through the many powerful impacts we can realize from the deceptively simple act of reuse.鈥� | WA
Reuse Leadership in Action: A Swan Song and a New Chapter
A Note from Sue Lasdin Momberger, P.E., Founding Chair of NYSAR3鈥檚 Reuse Committee
Facilitating this article marked the culmination of an extremely meaningful chapter in my NYSAR3 service as founding Chair of the Reuse Committee. When I joined the NYSAR3 Board of Directors, I was inspired to help our association live up to its name. As Diane Cohen, CEO of Finger Lakes ReUse, once noted, 鈥淩euse is our middle name,鈥� yet our 30+ year-old organization had never formally established a Reuse Committee.
That changed in May 2021, thanks to the encouragement of then鈥揃oard Member and now鈥揘YSAR3 President Dan Rain, who recognized the need to elevate reuse in our statewide strategy. The Reuse Committee launched with seven members and has since grown to 66 members鈥攔epresenting municipalities, nonprofits, educators, and businesses鈥攁ll working together to shift the conversation from waste management to resource stewardship. Its founding vision drew inspiration from Diane鈥檚 vision of a statewide reuse 鈥渆cosystem,鈥澛爄nspiring the committee鈥檚 foundational priorities and catalyzing long-term goals related to scalable infrastructure, community-based reuse, local economic development, and policy advocacy across the state.
That vision was deeply shaped by Diane, a career-long reuse pioneer whose leadership and community-based model elevated reuse from a thrift concept to a triple-bottom-line infrastructure solution. She has been a mentor and catalyst for our committee鈥檚 success, expanding my understanding of reuse鈥檚 true potential鈥攏ot just as a better choice than recycling, but as a social, environmental, and economic driver.
As a retired NYSDEC professional engineer and an emerging sustainability consultant and business owner, I had long advocated for recycling and reuse鈥攂ut Diane helped me see its broader potential鈥攏ot just as a storefront activity, but as an essential part of building resilient infrastructure of community-based reuse: local jobs, environmental benefit, and economic access. At the time, I had no idea the scale of opportunity in what Diane calls the 鈥渋nvisible economy鈥� which is now visible to me.
As I step down, I鈥檓 proud to support the transition to empower new leadership under Morgan Ingraham and to help carry forward the ambitious goals our committee developed together. These include fostering deeper collaboration between our committee and NYSAR3鈥檚 broader R3 community鈥攁 strategic priority of the current board. Thanks to the vision Diane helped spark and the passion of members who stepped up to lead, the Reuse Committee has become a springboard for collaborative projects shaping the future of reuse in New York State. These include joint initiatives with C.R.0.W.D. to elevate deconstruction and circularity, and joint conference sessions and other pilot collaborations with academic, grassroots, and community reuse partners. What began as shared inspiration has grown into replicable models, policy frameworks, and partnerships that reflect NYSAR3鈥檚 statewide leadership鈥攁nd the kind of cross-sector reuse movement this committee was built to inspire.
While I am stepping down as Chair, it鈥檚 just the beginning of a broader journey. Reuse is the future and this article shows our mentor, Diane, our dedicated committee, and reuse itself as a rising force in sustainable materials management and local economic resilience.
For more information, contact Diane Cohen, CEO of Finger Lakes ReUse, Inc. at (607) 257-9699 x 9914 or e-mail [email protected].