ATC and MGE: United for the community
MGE Chairman, President and CEO Jeff Keebler and ATC Executive Vice President and General Counsel Bill Marsan teamed up for United Way this year.
American Transmission Co. and Madison Gas and Electric Company recently collaborated on a friendly challenge to benefit United Way.
Both companies believe strongly in United Way and completed their United Way fundraising campaigns in October. This year, the company with the highest percent increase in United Way campaign participation got to choose the location of a volunteer activity led by ATC Executive Vice President and General Counsel Bill Marsan and MGE Chairman, President and CEO Jeff Keebler, who is also an ATC board member. By a small margin, ATC won the challenge and ATC employees selected the volunteer activity for all participants.
“Jeff reached out to me as ATC’s campaign sponsor to see what he could do to help support our campaign,” said Marsan. “We came up with this simple challenge as a way to energize each of our own campaigns. We knew it was a win for the community no matter which company came out on top.”
“We work together to serve our communities every day, and supporting United Way together is an extension of that call to service,” said Keebler, who is this year’s Vice Chair of Dane County’s United Way campaign.
The real winner was Eras Senior Network. On the crisp fall morning of Nov. 3, Marsan, Keebler and ATC employee volunteers did yard work and other seasonal chores at the homes of two local seniors. Eras Senior Network, supported in part by United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County, paired our volunteers with their clients, both of whom are in their early nineties and living in their own homes. Donna Kerr of Menomonee Falls has lived in her home since building it in the 1960s and raised her two children there. Don Schrock of Waukesha is a decorated Korean war veteran (fitting for this Veteran’s Day story), father and widower, and has lived in his home since the 1970s. Both Kerr and Schrock are able to live independently thanks to the extra help Eras Senior Network and its volunteers provide.
Marsan and Keebler had such a great time volunteering together that they plan to do it again later this month at Madison’s Community Action Coalition.
