Chappell Central Inc. of Willmar is proud to once again be part of the “Heat Up Minnesota” campaign together with Lennox International. The Lennox Campaign donates 100 furnaces to families in need across the state of Minnesota, and Chappell Central helped with the installation of two of them in the local Willmar, MN area.
We asked for your nominations for deserving families, and Lennox International chose two families to be awarded new furnace installations: Gawin and Sally Kooistra of Willmar and Donovan and Emily Slagter of Willmar. The furnaces for these families were installed on Saturday, October 4th by the Chappell Central Inc. staff.
Chappell Central Installs New Furnaces for “Heat Up Minnesota” Winners
Kooistra Family – Willmar, MN
The Kooistra Family lives in Willmar and have 3 children, one (Jaclyn) who was diagnosed with a severe kidney disease in 2005. Since then she has also undergone a kidney transplant donated from her Mom, Sally. During this time, while both Sally and Jaclyn were recovering, the family had no second income for quite some time, as well as frequent traveling to the Twin Cities while Gawin was left to care for the other two children. Earlier in 2014, Jaclyn got very ill again and was diagnosed with rejection of the transplanted kidney. She is currently undergoing medical treatment until a time when another transplant is needed. The Kooistra family has an old furnace and many medical and travel bills over the past nine years of medical treatments. Sally works for a nursing home in Willmar and Gawin works as a truck driver for Nelson International. Gawin has also been a fire fighter for the Willmar Fire Department for the past 22 years, as well as a fire training instructor at Ridgewater College.
Slagter Family – Willmar, MN
Emily and Donovan Slagter live in Willmar but recently have been financially strapped. Don was let go from his job in early 2014 which left the family with just Emily’s income as a hostess at McMillan’s in Willmar. Their furnace was 20-25 years old and has had expensive service issues in the past. Don has been on unemployment until just last week when he started his new job working out of state. He travels to Iowa on Mondays to build turkey and chicken barns and returns back home on Fridays for the weekend. The Slagter’s are enjoying having a quieter, reliable, and more efficient furnace in their home.
Chappell Central Inc. is very proud to be part of the “Heat Up Minnesota” program and the families they have helped together with Lennox International over the years. If you know of a family in need of a new furnace, we urge you to nominate them in the Heat Up Minnesota Program 2015!
Read about Past Winners of Heat Up Minnesota in Chappell Central’s area:
2013 HEAT UP MINNESOTA WINNERS FROM ATWATER AND KERKOHOVEN, MN
2012 HEAT UP MINNESOTA WINNER FROM SACRED HEART, MN
2012 HEAT UP MINNESOTA WINNER FROM WILLMAR, MN
