Dressing casual can help charity

Many offices have a casual Friday, but the Clark Fork Valley Hospital has put a new twist on it to benefit charities.

Blue Jean Friday, where the hospital staff pays $5 to wear blue jeans on Friday, has raised over $10,000 for charities and organizations, most of which are local. Blue Jean Friday, which was started in October 2005, passed the $10,000 mark in December. "Ten thousand dollars; that's a lot of money," said the program's founder, Kelly Horton. "I can only imagine how much it has helped all these groups."

Horton, the community relations and marketing manager for the hospital, said she had no idea that Blue Jean Friday could raise that kind of money when she started it in 2005 to benefit the Sanders County Cancer Network. She said that before she started the program, she really tried to get the word out by putting fliers and stickers around the hospital. She said that once Blue Jean Friday brought in nearly $400 the first month, she decided to keep it going. "That was just really inspiring to me and I thought, well, why not try it another month," she said.

Horton said she was surprised that the program still has a lot of support; 20 to 25 staff members wear Blue Jeans each Friday, according to Horton. "I think the reason that it hasn't fizzled out is because we're really proactive in trying to get the word out on what we're supporting," said Horton. She said they also get ideas on who to support from the staff and patients.

Horton said that last month they donated $350 to cystic fibrosis research, because of a request from an employee, who had lost a husband to the disease. This month they will be donating to a north central Iraq burn clinic because a woman whose son is serving in Iraq sent them a letter stating the desperate need for a health care system in the area, said Horton.

She said the charities not only benefit from the money, but they also benefit from the publicity Blue Jeans Friday brings them. "It actually has helped give recognition to some groups that people really didn't know about," she said. Horton said the Friends of Cathy, which the Blue Jean Friday has raised over $700 for, was one of the groups. She said many of the hospital staff hadn't heard of the Friends of Cathy before they raised money for them in April of 2006. Friends of Cathy is located in the west end of the county and raises money for travel expenses for people suffering from chronic diseases.

What has impressed Horton the most about the program is the staff's devotion to it. She said a lot of the nearly 200 people employed at the hospital don't earn a lot of money, yet they pay $5 each week to wear their blue jeans on Friday. "They're living paycheck to paycheck and they're still donating the $5," she said.

Horton said she hopes to see people walking down the hospital's hallways in denim for a long time to come. "As long as I can keep people interested in wearing blue jeans and paying $5, I'll keep doing it," she said.