SARGEANT – Workers at the giant Great River Energy electric generation plant may have cold toes working outside in the winter.

Monday, November 27, 2000

SARGEANT – Workers at the giant Great River Energy electric generation plant may have cold toes working outside in the winter.

But, they have warm hearts, too.

The hardhats are lending a helping hand to the Salvation Army Austin Corps’ seasonal appeal.

Local No. 343 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers passed the hardhat, literally, and raised $350 for the emergency food shelf operated by the Salvation Army in Austin.

Now, they will ask their local union to match the $350 contribution from employees to help the area’s Toys for Tots campaign at Christmastime.

"We hope the local union’s leaders, who must vote on this, will be willing to match the contribution of the workers at the Pleasant Valley station," Wesley J. Urevig, business representative for the IBEW local union, said.

Capt. Catherine Baugh, assistant Austin Corps officer, and property manager Jim Middleton visited the project site along Mower County No. 1 in Pleasant Valley Township Wednesday to accept the donation and express the Salvation Army’s appreciation for the gesture.

According to Baugh and Middleton, the money is needed to help with the anticipated large needs of the Salvation Army for the upcoming year-ending Christmas food baskets and other demands to assist the needy in Mower County.

Union steward Lloyd Brandt presented the check to Baugh during a brief ceremony at the work site.

Baugh and Middleton also learned how the spontaneous project from the electrical workers.

The electrical workers, all employees of Commonwealth Electric Co. Inc., simply had a good idea pitched to them and responded.

According to Jay Peterson, general foreman for Commonwealth, the idea was generated by Paul Snyder, a Commonwealth supervisor.

"He and I got to talking about what we could do and the idea to donate money to the Salvation Army came up immediately and later the workers decided it would be nice to donate to the Toys for Tots campaign, too," Peterson said.

"Everyone needs a helping hand some of the time in life and there are people who need help at Thanksgiving time," Peterson said. "It makes you feel good helping people, who might go without."

Doug Haines, one of the IBEW local union workers who contributed to the collection on the work site, said it was important to the workers that the money be spent locally.

"There are a lot of guys who work here who are from the area and we wanted to make sure the money stays here and helps local residents in Mower County," Haines said. "After all, we’re building this plant right here in Mower County and this is where the electricity is going to come from."

The $160-million plant is expected to be operational next summer. GRE of Red Wing is constructing the 434-megawatt gas-fired generation facility.

A 161-kilovolt transmission line will connect the peaking plant to an existing substation located in north Austin. The proposed transmission line also will provide a link between an existing Northern States Power transmission line and the Austin Utilities substation.

The power plant is intended to be a peak shavings plant for GRE’s customers. Both the electrical generating plant and transmission line addition will add an additional source of electrical capacity and improve electrical reliability to the Austin area.

Meanwhile, not only were the hardhats smiling Wednesday when they presented the money to the Salvation Army, one of them felt bold enough to issue another challenge to convince the world warm hearts can coexist with cold toes on the Minnesota prairie.

"We hope other guys on projects will want to do something similar to what the Commonwealth employees here are doing. We’d like to issue a friendly challenge to them to do that," Peterson said.