New Glarus Vision may not be one of the community’s most visible organizations, but its influence can be found behind youth sports, school programs, cultural events, scholarships and other familiar parts of life in our community.

The volunteer-led nonprofit serves as an umbrella for other organizations that need access to an established charitable structure. That allows those groups to concentrate on raising money, organizing activities and serving the community without each having to establish and maintain an independent nonprofit organization.

“Working together to develop goals and turn visions into actions that benefit our community,” is how New Glarus Vision President Tabatha Barnaby described the organization’s mission.

Barnaby said the group traces its roots to the early 1980s, when four local residents organized an effort to have a traffic signal installed on Highway 69. From that effort, New Glarus Vision grew into an organization with a much broader role in the community.