CLICK BELOW TO HEAR TJ RYAN’S INTERVIEW WITH MATT MARENGER
A downtown Escanaba business is looking to help the homeless population in a unique way.
Matt Marenger at Mr. Bike and Ski on Ludington Street says you can drop off all of those returnable cans that you can’t return now because stores are not accepting them due to the coronavirus.
“It has kind of gone viral in a way,” said Marenger, who adds that God put it into his heart to take up this project. “People just bag up their returnables in large plastic bags, tied at the top. They will drop them behind Mr. Bike, day or night, and we will then rubber glove them into an enclosed trailer and haul them off to a warehouse.”
The warehouse space has been donated by Travis and Julie Beauchamp, a local chiroprtacter who also has Beauchamp Mini-Storage. Once things get back to “normal”, Marenger says the owner of Sav-Mor IGA, Craig Carter, has agreed to help with getting the returnables turned in, in bulk, for cash.
Marenger says the money then will be given to people who are homeless in the area, and leftover money will help the Hope At The Inn. That’s a program that’s run by local churches which helps the homeless have a place to spend the night during the winter.
“I have no idea how much we’ll raise, but I can promise you that the money will be spent wisely,” Marenger said.
Marenger says he came up with the idea after seeing someone sleeping in the dumpster behind his store. He says that many people have a lot of cans in their garage and home that they don’t know what to do with.
Marenger says that in the first day-and-a-half after he publicized the idea last week on Facebook, he’s filled up two 12-foot-by-6-foot trailers with returnables.
Mr. Bike & Ski also has bikes that anyone can ride for free, a program that’s been going on for around a decade.
“Its called Anybody Rides,” Marenger said. “In ten years, we’ve districbuted over 2,500 free bikes. That’s a huge number. The way it works, is people give us bikes that they can’t use anymore. Not the one sitting out in the field, rusted, and in pieces. They drop them off with us, we recondition them, and then we distribute them to people who need bikes for essential travel. The last two weeks, I think we’ve reconditioned about 20 or 30 bikes. We have a list of about 50 people who are waiting for bikes.”
Mr. Bike and Ski is located at 1016 Ludington Street in downtown Escanaba. The phone number is 786-1200.
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