Roundup program passes $3 million mark
The spare change adds up a little at a time, month after month. And it has snowballed to do some pretty big things.
Since its launch 15 years ago, Flathead Electric Cooperative’s Roundup for Safety program has raised more than $3 million and helped pay for 835 projects to improve community safety.
The program that rounds the monthly electric bills of participating customers up to the nearest dollar quietly topped the $3 million milestone with its grant awards this month.
Roundup for Safety is an unsung hero, said Rex Harris, one of its nine directors. It has saved lives. And there’s probably not a car crash, fire, water rescue or helicopter flight in this area that doesn’t have some connection to it.
“Remember a few years ago when some dogs went out on the ice at Foy’s Lake and fell in and a woman went after them and fell in?” Harris asked. “The department was able to rescue her with gear that came from here. To me, that’s big bright lights about what this program does.”
The program has left fingerprints all over Northwest Montana.
Nonprofit groups can apply for a share of the roughly $18,000 that rounded-up electric bills raise each month. Competition for the money can be strong. Requests totaled almost $50,000 this month.
“The neat thing is we’re not here to accumulate a big deposit in some bank,” board chairman Jerry Bygren said. “We’re here to give away money every month to qualified nonprofit organizations for safety-related projects.”
Competition for the grant money this August left board members wrestling with all the usual questions: Which projects improve safety for the most people? Which projects best leverage the program’s money?
The Glacier National Park Conservancy asked for money to buy gear for park rangers to better respond to swift-water rescue situations. A church in Columbia Falls wanted help replacing a heavily used glass door that recently shattered with a tempered glass door that will not.
The Humane Society of Northwest Montana asked for money to help improve the fence around its pet park to keep dogs from sneaking out and possibly causing an accident on the busy highway out front.
North Valley Hospital Foundation asked for money to help buy automated external defibrillators for three of the hospital’s outlying clinics. Glacier Institute also wanted help buying three of the devices: One to take on hikes and two for camps that have 2,000 visitors a year.
Flathead Valley Lions Club asked for money to buy equipment to expand the number and efficiency of free eye exams it does in local elementary schools. The club did almost 3,000 exams last year and identified more than 400 youths who needed to see eye doctors.
Each of the requests and a few others were funded at some level — maybe not with as much money as groups asked for, but with enough seed money to help them leverage their own money and make the projects a go.
OVER THE YEARS, Roundup for Safety has helped buy more than 50 defibrillators. It has helped pay for navigation buoys, playground equipment, fencing, bike paths, lighting and a wide array of gear for police, firefighters and paramedics that ranges from helmets and Kevlar vests to night-vision goggles, thermal imaging equipment and Jaws of Life.
It even outfitted the ALERT helicopter with special cutters to safely snip Flathead Electric power lines if needed to land or take off in an emergency.
Everyone affiliated with Roundup for Safety has at least one project that sticks out.
Mike Radel is community projects specialist at Flathead Electric Cooperative and has worked with the program’s board of directors for 14 years. He helps nonprofit groups apply for grants and remembers the program putting in a fence at Smith Valley School where the playground is just a few feet from a busy highway.
“I took a picture of two little girls playing and there’s a great big semi log truck just blowing by,” Radel said. “That was probably one of the key moments for me that said, ‘This is really amazing.’”
Sarah Christensen remembers helping the Montana Wooden Boat Foundation buy a table saw with special sensors that stop its blade “before it cuts off any fingers.” The Lakeside nonprofit teaches children and others how to build boats.
“There’s been so many amazing ones that have helped so many people,” Christensen said about Roundup for Safety projects. A senior at Glacier High, she had never heard about the program before she decided to volunteer to join its board for one year through a program at the school.
“It’s been amazing to hear all of the nonprofits and learn about what is out there,” she said. “I never expected to hear so many people who are just trying to make a difference in the community.”
NOT ALL OF the Roundup for Safety grants have been without criticism. One of the more controversial was to help buy Tasers for school resource officers in Kalispell and Whitefish.
“There was a tremendous outpouring from within Flathead Electric that said, ‘No, you will not give money for Tasers because of the liability risk.’ So the funding was pulled,” Radel said.
“We have not done Tasers since.”
Other projects have drawn some complaints. But the program’s overall impact can’t be denied.
“One big message is for people to take a look around and realize the benefits the community has seen because of this program,” Radel said. “The number one thing is to say thank you to our members who allow their bills to be rounded up. Without them none of this would happen.”
ENROLLMENT IN THE opt-out Roundup for Safety program has fallen from 82 percent before the recession to about 71 percent. That’s still almost three-quarters of the cooperative’s 48,000 members participating in the program 15 years after its launch.
Roundup for Safety board members said they hope to see participation tick back up as the economy improves. They encourage people to call the cooperative and opt back in if they see any change in their electric bill amounts. They called it a good way for people to support nonprofit groups and safety projects with a little spare change that adds up to big things.
It never costs Flathead Electric customers more than $11.88 a year.
“I think people want to help their neighbors and I think this is a way they can find meaning in doing that in a relatively painless way,” board member Donna Ryan said. “We’re an organization that enables everyone to help in a relatively painless way, simply by rounding up their electric bill.”
Reporter Tom Lotshaw may be reached at 758-4483 or by email at tlotshaw@dailyinterlake.com