Any hints? Town of about 15,000, and it's a college town, but the nearest place that Craigslist ever has anything good is an hour's drive. Police auctions are rare, though I do have a university officer who's agreed to let me know if he spots anything good being discarded at the end of the semester.
I've been thinking about turning my old IronHorse AT20 (the 26" model that nobody seems to believe exists) into something of a utility bike, since the grocery store is only a mile and work is only three, but I'd be open to something else for a good price, and I'd really like a road bike too. My total project budget would barely cover a low-end Trek, though, so used-and-abused is pretty much the only way it's going to happen.
Mechanically, I can fix nearly anything by trial-and-error-and-persistence-and-Google, so the once-nice, rusted up bikes that have been forgotten in sheds would be great. For some reason, they just don't seem to be turning up at the garage sales anymore, and all we're seeing on FreeSharing is kids' bikes and WalMart cruisers.