How The Grinch Stole Christmas Toys From Needy Kids

I hadn't thought about this. Charities such as Salvation Army are having to sort through donated toys - many of them not in their original packaging - to determine if they are in the large group of toys that are on the recall list due to containing lead. It's a time consuming process for volunteers to sort through each one and check them against the list. Some charities are not taking toys at all, because of the confusion and extra labor required:

“You don’t know what you’re getting, you really don’t. You hear it on the news, what’s been recalled, but how do you know the other toy is not good?” asked Debbie Etnyre, a Salvation Army manager in Fort Wayne, Ind.

“So we just throw them all away,” she said. Many Goodwill Industries affiliates have adopted similar policies, among them local chapters in Colorado, Wisconsin, Hawaii and Massachusetts.

“Despite our great efforts, we are finding it increasingly difficult to keep up with the growing list of recalled toys. Until we can guarantee that recalled toys will not reach our shelves, we have made the decision that we can no longer sell toys in our retail outlets,” Goodwill Industries of Milwaukee said in a statement.

There's a problem in "throwing them all away." Because the toys contain lead, federal disposal regulations come into play. I suspect we'll be hearing from charities that they need money instead of donated toys so that they can buy safe toys for kids. Which would be a great idea.