Reuse Assistance Grant Progress Report

City of Chico's Reuse Assistance Grant Project (Part 1: February 1, 2005 to December 15, 2005)

Project Description

The City of Chico is promoting and improving the Habitat for Humanity ReStore. Additionally, increasing reuse in the City of Chico and surrounding communities by increasing advertising and education, reorganizing the ReStore, and purchasing rack and bin material, and a flat bed truck with lift gate. The County is benefiting from increased diversion and the reuse of materials.

Summary of Grant Task Activities

The Habitat for Humanity of Butte County ReStore (HFHBCR) in Chico, California requested grant funds to improve diversion and service provision of construction and housing materials for public use at reduced cost. This will be done through advertising, promotion, education and service delivery expansion. Through educational materials and advertisements in different media, the ReStore hopes to substantially increase donations of divertible housing material from contractors and other potential donors in Butte County, while at the same time increasing the HFHBCR customer base. This requires improvements in service delivery capacity, such as reconfiguring floor space use and the purchase of heavy equipment for increased material transport capacity.

During this phase of the grant implementation process, the City of Chico and HFHBCR are proposing changes in the original task plan submitted with the original grant proposal. After review of the tasks, the ReStore manager and City staff determined that it would be more beneficial to HFHBCR to spend more grant funds on expanding the ReStore service and delivery, and less funds on advertising and promotion, especially since the City and other organizations are helping to promote the facility. The exact proposed changes are discussed in the progress narrative below.

The steps required to accomplish their project are as follows:

Completed Tasks:
As of August 25, 2005, the ReStore manager retained a part-time volunteer grant administrator to help with implementation of grant requirements.

Task 1.1-1.4: Billboards—100 Percent Complete.
Secure Contract
Design Ad
Reserve Space
Purchase Space

Secure Contract, Reserve Space, Purchase Space
Billboards have traditionally been the most successful advertising and community awareness medium for HFHBCR. A billboard advertising campaign was designed in consultation with sales representative of Stott Outdoor Advertising. HFHBCR has had a longstanding relationship with Stott's Outdoor Advertising (SOA) which has resulted in the creation of billboard placements which best serve HFHBCR's advertising needs. As part of the billboard contract, SOA has offered a bonus of extra billboards as follows: if, at a particular location that has not been reserved for the month is in the same month in which HFHBCR has purchased billboard space, HFHBCR will be given that space for that month at no charge. Ninety-six 8-sheet posters were purchased at cost of $1,791 to cover the entire year, because buying them up front is cheaper than more frequent purchases. In devising the advertising campaign, their goal was to put up more billboards during February, March and April 2005 when many people are planning home improvement projects and businesses are conducting inventories. They rented six billboard spaces for those three months. From May through August, they rented three billboard spaces. Their reasoning was that fewer billboards would keep the ReStore in public view. For September through December 2005, they decided to intensify the advertising campaign, since this is another inventory time as well as the end of the charitable tax deduction period. Exhibit A shows the placement chart for the billboard space purchased for the 2005 advertising campaign stipulated as part of the grant work plan.

Design Billboard Ad
The ad copy for the billboards was developed by the ReStore manager and Pam Easterly, a Habitat Board member, and presented to the City of Chico and the California Integrated Waste Management Board (CIWMB) for approval, which was granted. The CIWMB logo was included in the ad, as stipulated in the grant acceptance protocols.

Task 17: Drawing Plans for Floor Plan Redesign—100 Percent Complete.
The floor plan redesign is included in Exhibit B. The units highlighted in yellow are the areas where new racking and bins will be placed to better utilize floor space at the store. The units will add 980 square feet of storage, and will significantly increase the ability to systematically organize and store materials. This floor plan is in addition to 180 square feet of storage space that the store manager added by creating a system of rails on the existing storage racks for lighting fixtures.

Task 22 and 23: Truck Purchase—100 Percent Complete.
In the interest of increasing efficiency in the collection of donated construction materials for sale in the HFHBCR, it was proposed in the original grant application to purchase a one-ton, flatbed truck with a lift gate. The first step was to locate a suitable truck for purchase, which the ReStore manager researched by calling six dealerships in the North State. As it turned out, the only truck in the region that fit the needs of the HFHBCR was at Wittmeier Ford in Chico, but the truck did not have a lift gate. The ReStore manager then proceeded to search for a lift gate, consulting with two businesses in Chico, but then decided to defer this in favor of purchasing a fork lift to better serve the needs of the ReStore. A photograph of the truck can be found in Exhibit C.

Task 21-26: Coordination of Collections—100 Percent Complete.
This task involves coordination of pickups to reduce the overall amount of trips needed to pick up divertible materials. Presently, donation requests are grouped together by geographical location in Butte County, then pickup sites are prioritized by overall amount of material, getting the biggest loads of material first, then proceeding to the next largest and so forth. Isolated or remote pickups are accomplished on a case-by-case basis. This is an ongoing grant activity over the life of the grant.

Task 24: Contractor Education—Ongoing.
The ReStore is referenced in Construction and Demolition Recycling educational brochure that was produced by the City of Chico (a copy is enclosed). These brochures are distributed with every building permit and are also given to on-site contractors though the North Valley Contractors' Exchange. The ReStore is also referenced in the Butte County Recycling Guide found in the Pacific Bell telephone books.

Task 25: Collection of Diverted Materials—Ongoing.
This task is spread out over the life of the grant, and so far, nine months have passed. The estimated mileage on the truck purchased using Reuse Assistance funds for diverted material pickups is 5,000. From February 2005 to present, using this truck, there have been approximately 360 pickups in Butte County, with an estimated average of ten pickups per week. Because of its logo, the use of the truck also makes the ReStore more visible to the public. The ReStore manager has noted that the donations have increased since HFHBCR is now able to offer on-site collections. Also, the ReStore manager estimates that monthly store sales have increased 10 to 15 percent since the purchase of the truck.

Proposed Changes to the Grant Tasks and Budget

Elimination of E-Bay and Direct Mail Tasks
The first proposed major change is to remove several grants tasks related to advertising, Tasks 2, 11, 12, and 16. The ReStore manager believes through his experience with customers at the store, that E-Bay sales would not significantly increase public awareness of the store, nor greatly enhance sales. Task 11, which relates to radio ads, is problematic due to the inability to track the effectiveness and cost-efficiency of this type of medium. Similarly, Tasks 12 and 16, which relate to a direct mail campaign, are also not the most cost-effective or time efficient means of advertising.

Proposed New Task 12: Home and Garden Show Booth.
In consultation with City Staff, the ReStore manager determined it might better serve the advertising needs of the store to have a booth at the Soroptimist International of Chico's Home and Garden Show to be held on March 18-19, 2006. The overall plan for this exhibit is to promote sales and donations to the ReStore. This Home and Garden Show represents a good opportunity, since those in attendance represents the type of audience and customers that the ReStore is trying to reach. The goal is to show that the ReStore receives high-quality materials and has the support of major contractors and businesses in the area, which dispels the myth that the materials at the store are of inferior or undesirable quality. Also, the ReStore hopes to gain the attention of possible donors of reusable materials. This booth can also be used to distribute fliers and educational brochures, thus providing a measurable outcome for the success of the booth. The ReStore also plans to include items for sale, another measurable outcome.

Therefore, the proposal is to remove Tasks 2, 12 and 16 and replace them with new Task 12. If approved, the City and Habitat are requesting the use of grant funds to purchase booth space and exhibit supplies, and to pay for staffing of the booth during the two-day event.

Proposed New Task 26: Purchase of a Fork Lift.
The next proposed change concerns Tasks 22 and 23, the purchase of a service delivery truck for the store. Although the truck was purchased, a lift gate has not been added. The ReStore manager determined that a better option would be substitute a forklift for the truck lift gate. The forklift will not only facilitate the lifting of materials into the collection truck, but would also assist in moving pallets of materials in the ReStore. The forklift would allow for more efficient handling of materials, and encourage more frequent and larger donations to the store. The cost of a forklift is estimated between $5,000-$7,000. Therefore, the City and Habitat are requesting that $5,000 of the funds originally allocated for the lift gate, together with the funding that would have be used toward E-Bay sales and the direct mailer, be reallocated for the purchase of the fork lift. HFHBCR is prepared to contribute $2,000 to the purchase if needed.

Elimination of Task 24: Visit Construction Sites.
Another proposed change is eliminating Task 24, which involves visiting construction sites to educate contractors on diverting materials. City Staff felt that this task really is included in Task 25 and is a duplicate task because education is typically conducted on-site at the time donated materials are collected.

Proposed Revised Budget and Task List:
As discussed above, the review of the budget tasks not only involved a proposed readjustment of grant funds, but also necessitated the readjustment of matching funds based on a more realistic assessment of the ReStore and Reuse Assistance Grant goals. Therefore, the City and HFHBCR are proposing to reduce the requested grant funds from $50,570.70 to $49,682.38 and to reduce the local matching contribution from $55,633.80 to $35,421.20, for a total project cost of $85,103.58. A revised budget and task list, which has been annotated to note the proposed revisions (color version), and a final copy of the proposed revised grant budget are attached in Exhibit D for approval.

Task 31: Submit Progress Reports/Payment Requests to CIWMB - 1 .
The last items for this progress report concern Task 31, Submit Progress Reports/Payment Requests to CIWMB. This report is the first one required for submission. Also, as part of the grant requirements for 2005, the monthly materials diversion figures are included in Exhibit E.

The following table summarizes the estimated tons of materials diverted from March through November 2005 through the ReStore.

*Permission was obtained from grant recipient to publish project profile.

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Last updated: June 25, 2008