Why international nonprofits call Fort Collins home

Elephant vasectomies in southern Africa. Teachers in Cambodia. Clean cook stoves in Central America.

While these causes seemingly have no connection to Larimer County’s philanthropic donors, they’re among a small percentage of Larimer County nonprofits dedicated to international causes.

Of the 374 Larimer County nonprofits listed in good standing with the Colorado Secretary of State, about 6 percent (or more than 20) operate internationally.

That 6 percent brought in 2.4 percent of the $1.2 billion in revenue for all Larimer County nonprofits and spent 2.7 percent of the $1.1 billion in Larimer County nonprofit expenses, according to the most recent financial information available through the Colorado Secretary of State.

The reasons for the organizations being based in Fort Collins vary.

One is here because the leading expert of cutting edge technologies called Colorado State University home. Another because a family was inspired to give back to the country that gave them their son. For one group, it all came down to a vote when organization founders decided they were tired of living in “the big city.”

Here’s a look at a few of the international nonprofits that call Larimer County home, and why they chose our community.

Elephant Population Management (EPMP) was created to reduce an ever-growing elephant population in southern Africa in a humane way.

In the most recent annual financial data available through the Colorado Secretary of State, Elephant Population Management Program brought in $35,615.

Mark Stetter, EPMP board president and dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at CSU, said there are now too many elephants for the amount of land available in the region, partly due to successful efforts to protect wildlife from poaching.

National parks and reserves staff are worried elephant overpopulation will destroy the native environment and affect other animal species, Stetter said. But there is “a lot of pressure” to not reduce the elephant population growth through hunting because of the intelligence and personality the animals display.

While Stetter was working as director of animal programs for Walt Disney World in Orlando, the company got some grant funding to help solve the problem.

Performing vasectomies on wild elephants was deemed a humane way to protect elephants and the land they inhabit. Laparoscopic techniques would allow veterinarians to perform the procedure in the field.

The industry leader in laparoscopic

surgery on large animals was Dean Hendrickson, a professor of surgery at CSU.

CSU, Disney, San Diego Wild Animal Park and Smithsonian National Zoological Park formed EPMP’s board and began performing laparoscopic vasectomies on wild elephants in 2005. EPMP was incorporated as a nonprofit based in Fort Collins in 2009 to handle a growing number of donations and grants.

The group has performed about 50 vasectomies since its inception.

Sustainable Schools International supports teachers and students in rural areas of Cambodia.

In the most recent annual financial data available through the Colorado Secretary of State, Sustainable Schools International brought in $201,886.

The organization was founded by Fort Collins resident Kari Grady Grossman after she visited Cambodia in 2001 to adopt her son, Grady, now 15. The family lived in Wyoming at the time.

Grossman saw many teachers were not wanting to teach in rural areas of the country because of inadequate pay, an inability to find housing and safety concerns for female teachers. She founded the Grady Grossman School in Cambodia but saw that more was needed.

Grossman worked a few years under the name Friends of the Grady Grossman School.

The family moved to Fort Collins to get their cause off the ground. Sustainable Schools International was incorporated in 2008 under a renewed mission to build teacher housing on school campuses, provide bathrooms, toilets and showers and offer a salary supplement program for teachers.

The program also supports 38 high school and college students through a residential scholarship program in Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capital.

Graduates are expected to return to their villages and complete a community service project. One graduate started a micro loan program to help pay teacher salaries. A nursing student is partnering with Tavia Mirassou-Wolf, a graduate student from CSU, to formulate a public health project for her village.

Trees, Water & People works with communities in Central America that have little to no access to electricity. The organization also works with

American Indian reservations in the U.S.

In the most recent annual financial data available through the Colorado Secretary of State, Trees, Water & People brought in $1.5 million.

The environmental nonprofit focuses on reforestation, environmental educational, renewable energy and clean cook stoves to fight “energy poverty,” or a lack of access to energy, said spokeswoman Megan Maiolo-Heath.

Its three founders — Stuart Conway and his wife Jenny Bramhall and Richard Fox, the organization’s current executive director — lived in Washington, D.C., when they decided to form Trees, Water & People.

The trio decided it was time for a change, so they took a vote on where the organization would be founded.

“They were fed up with the big city life,” Maiolo-Heath said. “It turned out that Fort Collins was on the top of everyone’s list. They decided it would be a great place for their families. ... The quality of life here is incredible.”

By the end of this year, Trees, Water & People will have installed 70,000 clean cook stoves throughout Haiti, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador, since its inception in 1998. The organization has trained thousands of locals in those countries on how to build the cookstoves, which use less fuel than open fires.

The organization has planted 5.6 million trees throughout Central America and Haiti, sold close to 5,000 solar home systems and lights in Central America, implemented nearly 1,000 solar heating systems through a tribal renewable energy program in the U.S. and trained about 200 Native Americans in different aspects of renewable energy.

Follow Sarah Jane Kyle on Twitter @sarahjanekyle or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/reportersarahjane.