Fort Collins CPA presides over international charitable fund

FORT COLLINS — Bob Garretson was busy preparing small business tax returns at his Fort Collins CPA firm when he broke away for an interview about his other life.

He serves as this year’s president of the Kiwanis Children’s Fund, formerly the Kiwanis International Foundation, which funnels millions of donated dollars into efforts to eradicate diseases that afflict the world’s children.

“I missed a meeting,” he joked when asked how it came to be that he was heading an international charitable organization. That old saw might often apply within local service clubs when members draft other members to take leadership roles. But when it comes to international positions, that’s rarely the case.

Garretson has, however, made his way through the “chairs” on his way to international leadership in an organization that seeks to help children who would otherwise die or, even, not be born.

He was recruited about 30 years ago to join the Eyeopeners Kiwanis Club in Fort Collins. He served on the board, then became secretary, then president. Kiwanis is a worldwide service organization with local clubs that are dedicated to help children and their communities.

From the Eyeopeners, he was recruited to serve as lieutenant governor, a leadership position that helps local club presidents in a region, in this case Northern Colorado. Then he ran for governor of the Rocky Mountain District, which includes Colorado, Wyoming and the panhandle of Nebraska, and served for the 2011-2012 term. 

Past governors serve on the district foundation. “Then several people put my name in to be a trustee on the international foundation,” he said. He served there for three years. Kiwanis International and its foundation are based in Indianapolis.

He didn’t want to run for the main Kiwanis International board, but he was persuaded to serve as treasurer of the foundation board, which started him through the chairs to the presidency.

The Kiwanis Children’s Fund, the new name for the organization’s foundation, has embarked on massive, multi-year projects. In the 1990s, the organization launched a campaign to eliminate iodine deficiency. Lack of iodine results in preventable brain disorders; it can be prevented with the simple addition of iodized salt to diets. Kiwanis directed millions of dollars to the campaign and largely accomplished the goal, although it continues to support efforts in places like Cambodia.

In 2010, the fund directed its attention to Eliminate Maternal Neonatal Tetanus. This campaign, like the IDD campaign, worked through the United Nations Children’s Fund, or UNICEF, to provide tetanus vaccinations to mothers as a way to prevent their babies from contracting the disease. “For 60 cents a shot, we give three tetanus shots to a mother to help save her baby,” Garretson said.

If a baby does contract the disease, it lives only about two weeks and dies an agonizing death, he said.

“Between IDD and the Eliminate project, we either raised or levered a quarter of a billion dollars to change the lives of children around the world,” he said.

While serving on the Children’s Fund board, he made a site visit to Cambodia. “That changed my view of the world and why we’re in Kiwanis,” he said.

“You watch young mothers being vaccinated or see them using iodized salt. You hear village people saying the word ‘Kiwanis,’” he said, as they acknowledge what the organization is doing in their midst.

“We’re here to serve kids. That’s still the mission. We help make a global impact. At the end of the day, we’re volunteers. We do a lot of this on our own dime. And at the end of day, there’s a child in a place you don’t know who will survive because of you,” Garretson, 69, said.

After his term as president, in the Kiwanis tradition he’ll serve another year as immediate past president, then he isn’t sure what lies ahead after that. 

“I’ll continue to volunteer,” he said.

Garretson will also continue to run his CPA firm, which he has for about 40 years after working as a chief financial officer for small businesses.

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