The Stranded Motorist Fund: Our Story
I need to tell you about something that changed how I think about this business. It's the reason we created the Stranded Motorist Fund, and it started with a pattern I couldn't ignore.
The pattern
When you run an auto repair shop long enough, you start seeing the same heartbreaking situation over and over. A single mom comes in with a check engine light. A head gasket, maybe, or a transmission issue. The repair is fifteen hundred dollars. She doesn't have it. She's not going to have it next month either.
Without that repair, she can't get to work. Without work, she can't pay rent. Her kids miss school because she can't drive them. One mechanical failure cascades into a full-blown family crisis. I've watched it happen more times than I can count.
It's not just single parents. It's veterans trying to get to VA appointments. It's elderly folks on fixed incomes who need their car to get groceries. It's the family that just moved to Colorado Springs for a fresh start and hit an ice patch their first winter. A broken car in a city without real public transit isn't an inconvenience — it's an emergency.
Helping quietly, then officially
For years, we just helped when we could. We'd cover a repair here, discount a job there. Our team would pitch in. It felt right, but it wasn't sustainable and it wasn't scalable. I was one shop owner making ad hoc decisions about who to help based on whatever cash was available that week.
I knew we needed something more structured. So we formalized it. The Stranded Motorist Fund became a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to providing emergency vehicle repairs to families in crisis. As a Navy veteran who's seen what service means, I couldn't stand by and watch people lose their livelihoods over a car repair.
How it works now
The fund covers critical repairs — the ones that stand between a family and their ability to function. We're not talking about cosmetic work or upgrades. We're talking about the alternator that died on a nurse who works night shifts. The brakes that failed on a dad driving his kids to school. The kind of repairs where "just wait and save up" isn't an option.
Applications come in, we verify the need, and we get the vehicle fixed. It's direct and practical, the same way we run the shop.
The funding model is what makes it sustainable. Through ShopGiv, everyday transactions at local businesses generate donations that flow directly to programs like the Stranded Motorist Fund. Every oil change could fund a family's repair — that's not a slogan, it's literally how the system works.
Why this matters to me
I didn't start this fund to feel good about myself. I started it because I was angry. Angry that a family could lose everything over a twelve-hundred-dollar repair. Angry that there was no safety net for something so basic and so fixable. A car isn't a luxury in Colorado Springs. It's infrastructure. It's how you participate in society.
The Stranded Motorist Fund exists because the gap between "your car broke" and "your life fell apart" shouldn't be as small as it is. We're working to widen that gap, one repair at a time.
If you know a family in crisis, or if you want to help fund repairs for families who need them, visit strandedmotoristfund.org. Every dollar goes directly to getting someone back on the road.