ABANDONED PROPERTY?

[JT08201]

Hello all, hoping to find some guidance... I work for a public agency and we have three (3) vending machines in our staff/employee lounge area. They do not work and have been here for approximately 10 years I'm told. "Legend" has it that approximately 5-6 years ago, the original company (small mom & pop) that had the machines here, sold to another company... that company serviced them for a year or 2, and we haven't heard from ANYONE since - about 2-3 years now. I inspected these machines form every angle, and there are NO identying stickers, labels, ect... and whomever dealt with the company is long gone now...

I want to get rid of thses machines. Is there a process for making notice that they are abandoned? and then getting rid of them?

thanks,

john

[Eagle]

When vending machines are installed in a building the vending company almost always signs an agreement with the owner or manager of the facility. This is common practice because the vending company needs to show the landlord an insurance policy. So, you should contact the agency head and explain the situation to him/her first. If you just take the machines without alerting anyone then someone can later point the finger at you that you stole them.

[JT08201]

thanks eagle for the reply.

that's the problem, no one, including the agency head, has any idea who the vending company is/was -- there are no records anywhere to be found, and not a single marking on any of the machines. i called a few local vending companies in the yellow pages in the hopes that one of them would have the account but they don't. No one has been onsite to service them in literally 2 years.

I thought maybe there was a process by which I could publish a public notice and then wait a certain amount of time and declare them abandoned?