Four semi trucks dropped off enough items to fill 12 households this week at the annual University YMCA Dump & Run garage sale, adding to an already large pile of products that included household appliances, electronics, wall hangings, office supplies and kitchen utensils.

Volunteers have spent most of the week arranging the variety of donated items on tables in the Stock Pavilion, 1402 W. Pennsylvania Ave. in Urbana, during their last three days of work before the sale starts today at 4 p.m.

Aimee Kandrac, director of development at the University YMCA, said the YMCA acquired such a prodigious amount of items that the sale had to be transferred this year from the YMCA building on Wright Street to the Stock Pavilion.

“When we started putting furniture on the lawn (the sale) got too big,” said Joyce Schields, a retired YMCA staff member and volunteer for the sale.

Volunteers began unloading and organizing items Sunday and worked until Tuesday in preparation for the sale, which is co-sponsored by the Office of International Student Affairs.

The event will run four days, ending on Saturday with a $2 bag day, which allows attendees to fill a bag with as many items as possible and pay $2 in total. Admission will cost $1 on Wednesday and Thursday but will be free on the other days, Kandrac said. International students will receive free admission for all days, Kandrac said.

Steve Shoemaker, executive director of the YMCA, said international students will also receive a $5 coupon at the sale’s start.

Computer hard drives are on sale for $15, VCRs for $10, bowls two for $1 and dresses for $4. Solid oak tables donated by Illini Tower and desks and dressers donated by Hendrick House sat among an abundance of sofas, bed elevators and other furniture covering one end of the pavilion.

Schields and Joyce Blessman, another retired YMCA staff member, situated apparel on the concrete steps inside the pavilion Monday. Schields and Blessman have volunteered every year since the event started 10 years ago.

Director of Operations Betty Earle, Blessman and Schields recalled the sale’s history even before it became part of the national Dump & Run program three years ago. All three women contributed to the start of the sale, which is “probably the biggest sale in town,” according to Shoemaker.

Schields said the sale began as an attempt to clean out the YMCA attic, which housed furniture and items left behind by 13 male students who stayed in the building. Schields and Earle wrote letters to the YMCA Board of Trustees and Board of Governors proposing a sale, which the boards approved. Schields said she took her pickup truck and traveled to houses in search of donations for the sale.

Today, the YMCA begins collections by placing boxes in private residence halls in May when students prepare to leave and continues gathering items throughout the summer, Kandrac said.

The Dump and Run program attempts to save useful items from a trip to the landfill, Kandrac said. The sale provides inexpensive products for the community, students and international students, who usually arrive at the University with only two suitcases in hand. Students can furnish an entire apartment with items bought at the sale for just $70 to $100, she said.

“It’s just a great program,” Kandrac said. “All of this stuff would be in the landfill if it wasn’t for this sale.”

The money earned from the event will be used for YMCA programs, including Vis-a-Vis, which serves as a mentoring program for grade school students, as well as for Alternative Spring Break and a number of international programs, Kandrac said. The remaining items will be sent to Salt and Light, a non-profit agency, which gives items to people in the community that are in crisis or in need, she said.

The sale runs today from 4 p.m. until 9 p.m., Thursday and Friday from 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. and Saturday from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m.