By Sharon K. Wolfe
BLOOMINGTON — Mothers and children are sleeping and eating on floors despite a downtown warehouse full of donated


furniture just waiting for volunteers to help.

“A lot of the furniture’s got labels — already picked out. Some days they can’t even use the truck,” said Della Burns, a receptionist at Recycling Furniture for Families, 515 N. Center St., formerly Recycling for Families.

With no one to drive an aging truck several times a month, about a dozen families are waiting even longer to get basic home supplies to start their lives again, said operations director Latricia Frison.

The nondenominational Christian charity picks up furnishings, inventories, cleans and repairs them, and delivers them where needed.

What they don’t have — and need desperately — are some helping hands to get the work done.

As it is, appointments are scheduled past Christmas for families to pick out the basics from a warehouse full of furniture. Frison wistfully says even “three or four more people” could help clients fill out a basic simple form to get the process started.

Families in need can get beds, dressers, a couch, chair, kitchen table and chairs, bedding, dishes, pots and pans and other necessities. Recipients are generally asked to donate $20 unless they’re homeless or escaping a violent household.

“We never ever have enough beds or dressers,” said Burns.

The group is always short of towels, pillows, sheets, comforters and mattress pads. Burns wishes motels and hospitals would donate their old but usable ones.

The typical family is a mom and children making between $10,000 and $15,000 annually from minimum-wage jobs, Frison said. McLean County residents need to meet federal poverty guidelines of $9,800 yearly for one person and $3,400 for each additional person. Referrals come from McLean County agencies and churches; if a referral comes from a church, a church official is asked to visit the home.

“I had a young lady fleeing domestic violence with three kids,” Frison said. All they had were blankets from a homeless shelter. “If it’s dangerous, you will leave that stuff behind.”

Recycling Furniture for Families tries to accommodate emergencies. A woman with only a chair and an air mattress got a bed quickly. After a house fire, “(Frison) jumped on it and got it taken care of in one day and arranged for delivery the next morning,” said board member Sharon McNamara.

One woman arrived crabby. McNamara was as kind as possible.

“I want them to experience love and kindness here. When she left, she was in tears. She left with a different heart,” McNamara said. “We try to give them as much as we can. But we can’t even give everyone a dresser.”

Volunteer Sam Schultz is retired and has physical ailments but spends 20 to 30 hours weekly on mailings, marketing and other office work. It gives him a reason to get up in the morning. “I got tired of four walls,” he said.

Schultz knows how the small group manages. “Our receptionist doubles as the cleaning lady. If Della catches up on the work up front, she’s got the vacuum cleaner out.”

Frison said Recycling Furniture for Families survives on “grace, nothing but God’s grace.”

The group’s only vehicle, a 1993 GMC box truck with 305,000 miles, ‘‘is just running on a wing and a prayer now,” McNamara said. “If that breaks down, we don’t know what we are going to do.”

The charity has one full-time and two part-time employees and about a dozen volunteers. Volunteer shifts for drivers and helpers are 4 to 7 p.m. Monday through Thursday, and 9 a.m. to noon Saturday. Moving equipment is available.

“We need people who can repair furniture — a weak leg, a dresser drawer that doesn’t close,” McNamara said. Some furniture needs painting or new items need assembling.

Volunteers are needed for a full day or half a day at least once a month to talk to families and go “shopping” with them through the warehouse during office hours.

“If 10 to 12 people come in just a few hours a month, well, it will add up,” said Schultz.