Two years ago, the Boys and Girls Club of Glacier Country was struggling financially to keep the doors open at its facilities in Evergreen and Columbia Falls.

The staff took volunteer cuts in their pay and benefits.

The nonprofit organization sliced operating expenses to the bone, reducing supplies, hours, training, field trips and even the number of prizes awarded to the children.

Slowly but surely, the Boys and Girls Club emerged from the depths of the recession that challenged many Flathead Valley nonprofits as well as local families and businesses. 

“We had every opportunity to shut down, but the kids kept us going. Every time you see those kids you realize we’re not done yet,” said Alan Sempf, the club’s executive director since 1999.

“By working together we weathered the storm and were able to catch up to a point we felt we could breathe again,” Sempf said. “Everyone is battle-tested, and our program is better than it’s ever been.”

Boys and Girls Clubs of America is a national organization of local clubs that provide after-school care for children.

Over the past few years, Boys and Girls Club of Glacier Country has seen its budget — a mix of donations, user fees and grants — fall from $600,000 to about $350,000. Yet participation keeps growing. An average of 150 children are involved in the after-school and recreation programs every day.

The chapter’s two units, in Evergreen and Columbia Falls, charge parents $20 a month for after-school care for one child or $40 a month for three or more children.

No child is ever turned away from the club. Parents who say they can’t afford to pay the fees are never questioned, Sempf said.

The clubs offer a broad range of activities such as arts and crafts, health and fitness, gardening, games, roller skating, fishing, computer time, outdoor recreation, service-learning projects, board games and field trips. 

The Evergreen club on Shady Lane, complete with its own roller-skating rink, buses students from Evergreen schools to the rink. 

The Evergreen club has a computer lab, offers physical activities in the gym, crafts, group discussions about dealing with things such as peer pressure and a dedicated time for children to read or do homework with tutors standing by to help. 

Everyone gets a healthy after-school snack and youths who don’t get in trouble at school get to roller skate a couple of times a week.

Structured activities carry youths through 6 p.m., when parents get off work and can come pick them up.

The roller-skating rink generates ongoing income for the club — close to $40,000 this year — which is funneled right back into operating expenses.

“We’re proud of the fact we’re able to generate some of our own income, operate in the black and support our own youth,” Sempf said.

In Columbia Falls, Boys and Girls Club members meet at both Glacier Gateway Elementary School and the former Episcopal church across the street with the same format of after-school activities.

“The club is a stress-free environment where kids get to be kids,” Sempf said.

He said the challenges of the recession, which started about 2008 and continued until recently, were a far cry from his early years on the job when the local economy was booming.

“To me it was so personal,” he said. “I was the first employee hired in 1999. It was a tough deal to go from expansion and growth to cutting things to a skeleton level.”

During the past few years, the club’s board of directors has increased from two to seven members.

“They have invested their time and experience,” Sempf said. “They rolled up their sleeves and rebuilt the budget, policies and procedures.”

Sempf pointed out that the Boys and Girls Club is a local economic stimulator in itself, bringing about $1 million of outside money to the Flathead over the last five years.

“Through federal, state and private grants, as well as generous part-time residents who remember us during the holiday season, those dollars are injected into our local economy and benefit everyone,” he said. “We’re generally able to match every local dollar that’s donated to us at least three times with grants and foundation donations — not a bad investment when you consider the good it’s doing for the kiddos.

“I see us as a benefit beyond giving kids a safe place,” he added. “We’re not a burden on the economy. We help and support it.”

For more information about the Boys and Girls Club of Glacier Country, or to find out what kind of donations are needed, call the Evergreen club at 752-5440 or Alan Sempf at 261-4232. Donations for either club can be mailed to: P.O. Box 7475, Kalispell, MT 59904.

Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.