BIG RAPIDS – Winter is just around the corner and the West Michigan Air Conditioning
Contractors of America and the ACCA Ferris State University student chapter teamed
up for the third annual “Heat the Country” on Oct. 4.
Six licensed contractors and six Ferris chapter ACCA students assisted two elderly women in Big Rapids by cleaning, servicing and replacing furnace parts at no service charge. The contractors and students also helped residents at Weston Jubilee Housing in Grand Rapids, and visited homes in Lowell, White Cloud and Grant.
“This is a good thing to do for the people around us,” said Jan Anderson, HVACR department secretary and faculty advisor of the student chapter. “To help the less fortunate is the right thing to do.”
According to the Heat the Country mission statement, its purpose is to provide heating assistance to elderly and military homeowners who could not otherwise afford the cleaning and repair services, and to non-profit agencies who serve elderly and unfortunate families.
Anderson said many of the furnaces needed clean filters and HVACR suppliers gratefully donated filters, equipment, trucks and volunteers.
In the three years of Ferris’ contribution to “Heat the Country,” 18 home furnaces have been serviced, Anderson added.