A Georgia nonprofit is on a mission to give building materials new life [Video]

Savannah, Georgia — If historic homes are the fabric of Savannah, Georgia, Mae Bowley is the thread, salvaging precious materials from those about to be torn down.

“I got bit by the old building bug, and the next thing I knew, I was a warrior for these old building materials, trying to do everything I could to keep them out of the landfill,” said Bowley, who is the executive director of the nonprofit Re:Purpose Savannah.

Bowley showed CBS News an example of irreplaceable wood, hundreds of years old. It’s the kind of wood Re:Purpose Savannah salvages when it convinces owners to deconstruct a building instead of demolish it.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the construction and demolition industry in the U.S. sends an estimated 145 million tons of waste to U.S. landfills, accounting for a quarter of all …