Clean Sweep, Bates College’s ‘garage sale,’ returns for 12th year

A “garage sale” on a massive scale that benefits the environment, community organizations and countless satisfied shoppers, Bates College’s Clean Sweep returns for the 12th year at 8 a.m. Saturday, June 16, at Underhill Arena, 145 Russell St.

As students pack up to leave Bates at the end of the school year, they donate to Clean Sweep all kinds of still-valuable possessions — electronics and toys, household goods and small furnishings, bikes and books, sporting goods and more. Faculty, staff and the college itself also donate items. The annual sale keeps these perfectly usable items out of the landfill, and the proceeds go to local nonprofits.

To learn more, please call 207-786-6207.

Bates is one of a number of colleges and universities nationwide that hold such sales. Drawing some 800 bargain-hunters from the Lewiston-Auburn region, last year’s event at Bates raised more than $16,000 in proceeds divided among 14 local nonprofits.

An annual tradition for both the campus and local bargain hunters, the sale is staffed by volunteers from the nonprofits, which in return receive a share of the proceeds.

Located in Lewiston except as indicated, the nonprofits taking part this year are: the Caleb Group (River Valley Village); Common Ties Mental Health Services; Dominican Sisters; First Universalist Church, Auburn; the Justice, Ecology and Democracy Collective, Greene; the Life Center at John F. Murphy Homes, Auburn; Lots to Gardens; Maine People’s Alliance; the Root Cellar; the Share Center, Auburn; Somali Bantu Community Association; Support Solutions; TriCounty Mental Health Services; and the Trinity Jubilee Center.