The Bend Police Department is struggling to find a lead pointing to whoever is responsible for the loss of $150,000 worth of textbooks from Central Oregon Community College over the course of a year.

“Nobody knows the answers to the questions we have,” police spokesman Lt. Chris Carney said. “We’re hoping for a break — hoping that the public will assist us.”

An annual inventory in July revealed $150,000 worth of textbooks unaccounted for over the previous year. That’s a significant amount for a community college with about 11,000 for-credit students, said bookstore director Lori Willis. Textbooks account for the entire loss — not any other supplies or course materials sold in the store, she said.

“Textbooks are a lucrative business,” said bookstore assistant director Frank Payne. “People tend to look for easy targets, and books can be at a high price point.”

The bookstore quarantined its textbook section starting in September, requiring students to hand their school schedules to employees who then retrieve the books. Willis said four to five more temporary employees were hired for the new system, which eliminates the opportunity for someone to put a textbook into a bag or jacket.

“The transition has gone really well, so far,” Willis said. “It’s been very well received by students.”

She said bookstore managers will tweak the system over the next two quarters. If it works fluidly and students accept it, the store will keep the system and make it a permanent fixture.

“I don’t think there will ever be a point in time that we go back,” Payne said.

Textbook theft is not uncommon among bookstores and libraries.

In 2013, the Los Angeles Times reported 13 school workers and librarians were indicted for stealing about 7,000 books from public schools and reselling them. In 2011, four people were accused of stealing library books from Georgia Gwinnett College and selling them to an off-campus bookstore.

“People would try all sorts of things,” said Tony Sanjume, director of retail services at the Lane Community College bookstore in Eugene. “There was a story I heard one time, where a husband and wife would go into a store with their kid in a stroller and the husband would distract everybody while the mom stuffed books in the stroller and her purse. They’ll find any way.”

Lane Community College, with approximately 13,000 students, due to its enrollment size, allows students to hunt for their own books in the bookstore. Plus, it hasn’t had as big a problem with theft.

“We need to have it open mostly because of how big the school is,” Sanjume said. “If we were a much smaller school, I’m sure we would consider (closing access to students).”

This year, the Lane bookstore reported “shrink” from 2012 to 2013 of $20,000. A “shrink” is the loss of a product by way of employee or customer theft, unsold books, improperly ringing up materials or accounting error. Sanjume said he was unable to see how much merchandise the bookstore lost from theft alone.

The loss is not significant, considering the store generates about $6 million in textbook revenue.

“We’ve been pretty lucky with our shrink numbers,” he said.

Payne came to the COCC bookstore in August, just over a month after the loss was discovered, from the Powell’s Books chain in the Portland metropolitan area.

He said Powell’s loses inventory to theft, as well, sometimes with the thief attempting to sell the book back to another Powell’s location.

But most of the time the books end up on eBay or Amazon.

“It’s such a challenge,” he said. “With Internet companies like eBay and Amazon, you can give a fake name and have a fake profile to sell the books. It’s hard to fight that.”