By Shelby Stewart-Soldan
Goodrich — On March 14, Two Mike’s Plumbing and Heating is holding their quarterly senior day of service.
“It is us doing free work for seniors,” said Tracy Butcher, managing member of Two Mike’s Plumbing and Heating. “Small jobs, like running toilets, leaking faucet, furnace filter changes.”
Butcher, who owns Two Mike’s with her husband Mike Butcher, is a Meals on Wheels delivery driver. She said while she was picking up meals, she heard people at the senior center saying that they had things that needed fixing in their house but that they couldn’t afford to hire someone.
“The little bit that we can do is plumbing and heating work on a small scale once a quarter in Goodrich and Ortonville,” she said “That’s what we do. I think both of us, Mike and I, feel the whole point of being comfortable in life is so you can help others. If we heard that a family needed something done and couldn’t afford it, we’ve just done it for people. That’s harder in a lot of cases, but we’ve always been that way giving back to our communities. This is just another way to do it.”
Any senior in the Goodrich or Ortonville area can call Two Mike’s Plumbing and Heating office by March 12, 810-624-2343, and the dispatcher will schedule the small jobs for them for March 14.
“Our dispatcher schedules them in a way so our techs can get to as many as possible,” she said. “The thing that we’ve found is some people think there’s a catch. We don’t try to sell them, we just fix what we can, we leave a receipt with a zero so they can show they’ve had work done at their house by a licensed plumber.”
Butcher said she hopes this program will help people stay independent and in their homes for longer.
“My theory is that if we help our seniors stay in their own homes, they have a higher quality of life,” she said. “As long as they’re physically and mentally able to stay in their home, they should be able to if they so choose.”
Butcher also said they hope that other industry professionals might want to partner with them in other trades, such as licensed carpenters or handymen who would be willing to help with small projects for area seniors.
“We would also needs sponsors of some kind to cover the cost of bigger projects,” she said. “We try to keep our prices where they’re lower so people can afford to get the work done. We don’t price things in a way that gives us a giant profit margin to have furnaces or water heaters in stock to just put them in homes.”
Anyone looking to partner for the Senior Day of Service, or who wants to get on the schedule for March 14, can call 810-624-2343.