Recycling cell phones pays for charity for troops in Iraq

NY Times:

Their bedrooms are strewn with the everyday flotsam of a teenager’s life: heaps of unfolded laundry and a bottle of “passion” red nail polish, muddy soccer cleats and the box for Madden N.F.L. 2002, a video game.

But after a long day at school, after softball and chorus and cheerleading, Brittany Bergquist, 16, and her brother, Robbie, 15, come home to an extracurricular activity remarkable even among the high-achieving teenagers in this well-to-do Boston suburb: They run a nonprofit — with a hand from their parents — that has raised $1 million for phone cards for American troops overseas.

They started the charity, Cell Phones for Soldiers, nearly three years ago with far smaller ambitions. Before school one morning, a few days after a cousin deployed to Baghdad, they watched a news story on television about a Massachusetts soldier struggling to pay off more than $7,000 in charges for cellphone calls home from the Persian Gulf.

“It really hit home because we had a cousin serving overseas,” Brittany recalled Tuesday evening, between softball practice and an honor-society induction ceremony. “We felt it was kind of our duty to make a difference.”

She and Robbie pooled $14 from their piggy banks and collected another $7 from classmates. The opening of an account at a local bank, which donated $500 to the cause, was followed by a bake sale, a yard sale and a car wash outside Town Hall.

Their plan to help that one soldier broadened when the pair heard that recyclers paid for used cellphones. They began by asking friends for old phones. Within weeks, Brittany, Robbie and their parents had persuaded local shops, police stations and government offices to set out recycling bins.

Three years later, the Bergquists’ recycling network spans more than 4,000 drop-off sites located in every state and in England, Canada and Japan, and yields some 20,000 cellphones a month, which fetch an average of $5 each from a Michigan recycling company that refurbishes them for resale.

The shipments from Cell Phones for Soldiers are “an equivalent quantity to what some of the national chains are bringing in from their customer recycling programs,” said Mike Newman, a vice president at the recycling company, ReCellular Inc., whose clients also include Sprint, Verizon Wireless and Best Buy.

With the recycling proceeds and some cash donations, the Bergquists buy phone cards worth up to 60 minutes each in international calls. They send the cards to service members and their families or military units that place requests through the charity’s Web site, cellphonesforsoldiers.com.

Nearly 400,000 cards have shipped. That number is expected to grow sharply over the next few months, when AT&T Inc. makes a few hundred of its Cingular stores nationwide official drop-off sites.

Though the family gets some envelope-stuffing help from volunteers, there is no paid staff. Bob and Gail Bergquist — both public school teachers — and their children handle much of the work from home.

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This is an extraordinary effort that touches the lives of the troops and their families in ways that are personal and supportive. It is a real morale booster and these two teenagers deserve recognition for their efforts. Bush 41 might give them a points of light award. The President should also find a way to honor their support for our troops at a time when Democrats are trying to cut off support for those same troops.