Jason Townsend
Jason Townsend has done much more than just spend time working at SWEPCO for the last 6-plus years. He’s spent hundreds of volunteer hours outside of work year after year.
In 2022, Jason spent more than 500 volunteer hours working with high school teenagers in the Texarkana area, one of the highest number of officially logged volunteer hours recorded by a SWEPCO employee.
“I didn’t know this was even a thing,” Jason said he remembered thinking after first being told about SWEPCO and AEP’s emphasis on community involvement and volunteering.
All SWEPCO employees are encouraged to internally track and log community volunteer hours. As part of AEP’s ‘Volunteer 25 by 25’ campaign, the goal is to have 25 percent of employees volunteering and recording hours by 2025.
And Jason, who works as a property and fleet manager in Texarkana, has spent the majority of his volunteer hours doing something he genuinely loves to do.
“I love fishing”, explained Jason who then revealed how he turned his personal joy into a personal campaign of giving back.
It began in 2018 when he first signed up to be the volunteer coach of the Genoa Central (Ark) High School Fishing Team. Soon after, he started the nonprofit, ArkLaTex Bassmaster High School and Junior Fishing Trail.
“It gets them out of the house,” continued Jason, in his mind, solving a parent’s age-old dilemma: how to get their kid to put down their cell phone and get more active.
Jason Townsend and the Genoa Central High School Fishing Team recently purchase Christmas gifts for a local family in need.
He recently led 22 teen anglers onboard 11 boats during a recent bass fishing tournament on Wilkes Lake.
“For the first time since I took over the fishing team, every team weighed a fish,” a proud Jason shared on the heels of the event located next to SWEPCO’S Wilkes Power Plant near Avinger, Texas.
He says he was remarkably stunned by the beauty of Wilkes Lake, one of the best kept secrets in the ArkLaTex, according to Jason.
“Before we left the lake, we had several captains and parents who were just captivated by the lake and grounds. Everyone kept saying how beautiful it was,” continued Jason.
And when his 2023 volunteer hours are tabulated, it’s expected that Jason will easily log more volunteer hours than he did the year before, namely because he has added to his volunteer assignments. This past fall, he signed up to also coach the Fouke High School Fishing Team.