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Happy New Year Four Seasons friends, and welcome 2021! Like most of you, we are happy to put 2020 behind us, and look forward to happier times with our Four Seasons friends! January is the time to begin collecting important documents that will be needed for tax filing in April, estate planning, etc. It's a good time to purge your files of unneeded documents, receipts, etc. from 2020. But there are safety issues involving document purging, so let's look at some of the ways to rid your files safely and securely. It is extremely important that documents that contain sensitive information such as your name, address, account numbers, social security number, telephone number, etc. not be thrown in the trash. Identity theft has been traced back to documents that were placed in the trash and found at dumpsites by people looking to steal your identity. There are much safer ways to destroy unwanted documents that will ensure your identify is not compromised. Home document shredders are the easiest, and most economical choice for destroying documents. When shopping for a document shredder, invest in a machine that will accept at least 12-15 documents at a time, has a credit card slot for shredding old cards and most importantly, is a "cross cut blade" shredder. The cross cut method ensures that someone can not easily reconstruct your documents and steal your identity. Good quality document shredders can be purchased at most large retailers and office supply stores. If you choose not to purchase your own document shredder, or have saved a large amount of documents for several years, you may want to choose to take your documents to a commercial shredder. Locally we have The UPS Store at 1440 Beaumont Avenue and the Staples Store in Yucaipa. They can take large volumes of documents, but they do charge a fee per pound of paper. Stay with your document containers and observe the staff shred them in your presence to ensure they were destroyed safely. At various times during the year, local retailers offer on-site shredding by mobile shredding companies. Watch for banners and signs outside local businesses that display dates when the document- shredding trucks will be available. Sometimes this service is provided free of charge, so watch for those opportunities. Be safe and happy New Year to all! ~ Donna Gilbreth, dgilbreth52@gmail.com 24 FOUR SEASONS BREEZE | JANUARY 2021 Neighborhood Watch