FARMINGTON – Franklin County Sheriff Dennis Pike remembers traveling down to Portland in 1956 to pick up the department’s then-new International Harvester civil defense truck.
Back then, he said, it hardly mattered that you could only lock the cab from the outside on the passenger’s side. Hardly anyone locked their doors at all.
This week, he’ll be trying to sell the truck, and will be saying “goodbye” to it in a very different way than he said “hello.”
Pike told the Franklin County commissioners Tuesday that, in hopes of getting more for it than he might by just advertising around Franklin County, he has decided to try to sell the vehicle online using the Internet auction site eBay.
The site allows people to set up online accounts and then use their accounts to buy and sell items. The items are advertised at ebay.com for a period of time determined by the seller – usually a week or 10 days. People interested in the item can bid against other interested people, and the item goes to the highest bidder. Sellers pay eBay a listing price and a percentage of the sale price, and work out shipping or pick up of the item with the buyer.
A Tuesday night search of police vehicles for sale on eBay provided a list of 114 that are currently for sale through the auction site.
But, eBay can be a complicated system to use for people with online experience, and Pike said that since he has little Internet experience, he has given the project to a department employee to carry out.
Pike said he thinks the International S120 four-wheel drive panel truck might make a good addition to someone’s antique-car collection. The Cold War-era civil defense vehicle is officially half-a-century old this year, Pike said. “It was made on special order from the government” to rescue people in the event of a nuclear attack, he said.
The department decided to sell because “it is difficult if not impossible to get parts for that type of vintage vehicle now,” Pike said. “It’s probably time to liquidate that asset and move on,” he said.
Pike said he plans to set the minimum bid for the International at between $2,500 and $3,500, and said he hopes to get more for it. “Whether it is successful and beneficial, I can’t say until it’s over,” he said.
Pike said he thinks this is the first time the sheriff’s department has tried to sell anything online. “I think this is probably a new threshold that we are hoping to explore,” he said.
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