MILLTOWN

INEZ WILSON thought she was doing a good deed recently when she put some old jeans and sweat shirts into one of the many clothing bins in the parking lot of the East Mill Shopping Center in Milltown. Ms. Wilson intended to give her clothes to a charity, hoping they would go to someone who needed them. Instead, she may have done nothing more than make a few dollars for a business that sells used clothing for profit in third-world countries.

The practice of used clothing businesses posing as charities has become so widespread that New Jersey lawmakers passed a law that went into effect earlier this year allowing municipalities to license and regulate bin operators.

“It would bother me a lot if these clothes weren’t going to help people who need clothes,” Ms. Wilson, a New Brunswick resident, said after hearing about the new law. “Giving clothes to someone who is going to sell them is not what I had in mind.”

The bill’s sponsors included Assemblyman Paul D. Moriarty, a Gloucester Democrat, who said he was inspired after reading in a magazine how many bins were operated not by reputable charities but by businesses. Often the businesses, Mr. Moriarty said, use deceptive signs and wording on the bins to try to persuade people the clothes will be used to help the needy.