Making an Impact with Build-a-Wheelchair®

September 14, 2022

Caring for Our Communities

Through Wabtec's "Caring for Our Communities" program, we have long worked to meaningfully impact communities and support employee volunteerism efforts. We are committed to being stewards of the communities where we have facilities and where our people live. Earlier this week in Erie, over 90 LEAD program members, along with representatives from the MyAbilities and Veterans Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) worked on a Build-a-Wheelchair® volunteer project to build wheelchairs for two non-profit organizations (VA Medical Center and Chosen, Inc).

Build-a-Wheelchair® is a program born out of a desire to help American veterans and others with various mobility challenges. Wabtec groups used teamwork skills to learn how to assemble, test and decorate these new wheelchairs for donation. Volunteers were grouped into nine teams, each building two wheelchairs for a total of 18 wheelchairs built. As a fun twist, the event was even a bit of a competition – each team had to answer questions to get the parts and materials to put the chairs together. After being built, all wheelchairs were quality tested with head-to-head races and have been donated to the non-profit organizations. Kudos to event leaders Stephanie Spence, LEAD Program Manager, Brian Kelly, Manager, Product Safety & Regulatory Compliance, and Jeremy Crist, Senior Value Engineer, along with all event participants on finding a new way to engage with the Erie community and help those in need.