The marathon of collaboration

Have you ever had an idea that could benefit more than just you?  Maybe it is something you love to do and want to share it, maybe you've seen it done in another community, or maybe you've even tried and didn't get the momentum or support you needed the first time around. Over the past 20 years at the Seeley Lake Community Foundation (SLCF), we've watched these small ideas grow into community-wide projects that bring benefits to so many beyond the instigator. When we can articulate a common goal and come together through collaboration, those baby steps may seem really slow, but over time, the support and energy gathered can turn into running a marathon together. 

One of these marathons started with a blizzardy drive to Helena.

In 2018, after the terrible fire season Montana had in 2017, the Montana Community Foundation (MCF) convened a workshop looking at post-disaster needs around the state. Two SLCF board members drove through a blizzard in February to Helena to present to a group of funders that the MCF had convened.

Our board members shared about how Seeley Lake was impacted by the worst smoke in the country during the Rice Ridge fire and about all the stress of evacuations and worries that our whole town could burn that summer. From that presentation, the SLCF was invited to submit a grant proposal to the Center for Disaster Philanthropy, which was looking to fund a project to support children in 'low-attention disaster areas' (aka Montana).

The SLCF reached out to our friends at Seeley Lake Elementary (SLE) to figure out what type of support our local school needed--ideally something that would also be of interest to this grantor. Working with Angela Harris and Heather Mincey, we determined that helping to shore up declining mental health support for a year would be a great fit. The SLCF was able to secure over $40,000 for SLE to help fund the school counselor for a year, as well as provide trauma trainings to school staff and to community members.

In the fall of 2018, the Center for Disaster Philanthropy decided to visit Montana to see what impact their work was having. They brought along some of the folks from a major funder of theirs, Margaret A Cargill Philanthropies. Cargill is one of the largest private foundations in the entire country. And two program officers came and visited Seeley Lake! SLCF board and staff showed the program officers from these two foundations around town, took them on a tour of the school and highlighted the huge risk wildfires pose for our community.

This was significant, because these funders hadn't spent much time in the West and although they focus on disaster support, before this grant, they hadn't funded much wildfire work. Seeing our huge amounts of forests and mountains on the drive from the Missoula airport was an eye opener for them. We were able to show them a glimpse of the realities that towns across the intermountain West, like ours, face.

The impact of this collaboration was powerful. The SLE grant was very innovative (read: unusual!)-since these funders usually give dollars for traditional post-disaster work, like rebuilding houses after a tornado. Mental health support for children after a stressful wildfire season was a creative way to get funding for a need that already existed in our community, while helping push the envelope of what disaster support could look like.

Later in 2018, after the CDP and Cargill Foundation visit, northern California erupted in the worst fire year in that state's history, making national news. Perhaps their 'test' grant here, and their on-the-ground visit, opened eyes and planted a small seed for how these organizations could continue to think creatively and innovatively on what disasters will look like moving forward and how to help people recover from them.

Fast forward to 2020 - horrible fires raging in California, Colorado, and Montana again, plus all the stress of COVID. We're forced to realize how important mental health is for coping with stressful events out of our control. Reflecting on this makes the ripple effects of a snowy February drive to Helena seem even more important.

This is the power of collaboration. Making connections, forming relationships, building bridges, sharing your story and helping the world. Running a marathon is composed of many tiny steps!

This is just one story over the past 20 years in which the Seeley Lake Community Foundation has played a role. While the role changes, sometimes through funding, other times through facilitation and sometimes as the instigator, the amount of work we can get done together when seeking a common goal is endless.