Maryland Community Newspapers Online
When Gerry Rosenkrantz set out to refurbish computers in 1995 as a way to keep from being bored in retirement, he had no idea his work would eventually spawn a nonprofit organization that now turns out 250 computers a month for low-income families and organizations across the county.
The 76-year-old North Bethesda resident shared his story of how Project Reboot came to be with a crowd of residents, elected officials, county agency representatives and others who gathered Friday morning to celebrate a new home for the organization.
Until the end of the summer, Project Reboot, which is part of the nonprofit educational organization Capital PC User Group, had been operating for several years out of a county-owned house at 101 Fleet St. in downtown Rockville.
With the support of McShea & Company Inc., which provides commercial real estate services and support to businesses and organizations, and TA Associates Realty, a company specializing in real estate investments with offices in Boston and Newport Beach, Project Reboot was able to move into a large warehouse space at 4 Choke Cherry Road in Rockville.
Rosenkrantz, a retired economist for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said rent in the new location will be $10 a month, which does not include utilities.
Mary Anderson, a spokeswoman for the county, said the move was necessary because there is a project in the pipeline to build affordable housing on Fleet Street. The project threatened to boot Project Reboot out of the house in 2006, but the organization was granted a reprieve and allowed to stay.
County Council President Philip M. Andrews (D-Dist. 3 of Gaithersburg) thanked Project Reboot for its service to the community and presented the organization with a proclamation from the county.
"Project Reboot has provided these refurbished computers to disadvantaged youth, visually impaired individuals and others in need who otherwise would not be able to fully participate in the modern information age," he said.
Project Reboot, which sells its computers for $10 each, also prevents more than one ton of computers per week from ending up in landfills, Andrews said.
Carl Johnson, a retired biochemist for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, said he has volunteered with Project Reboot for two years. The organization consists of more than 30 volunteers.
"We're saving computers that would have been thrown away on the dump and we're able to fix them up, put in some new parts and get them going and get them to clients and people who are referred to us by county service agencies," the 70-year-old Layhill resident said.
Kenneth Mulligan, a 24-year-old volunteer, said he enjoys working for Project Reboot because it lets him tinker with computer equipment and also help people.
"My favorite thing is that I get the opportunity to work with a lot of different equipment and also the computers I fix are going to people who can benefit from them — they're going back to the community and kids who don't have them," the Gaithersburg resident said. "I get the opportunity to do what I love and help somebody at the same time."
Project Reboot has received donated computers from Montgomery County Public Schools, county residents and private corporations. The county's Department of Environmental Protection's Division of Solid Waste Services also sets aside computers and parts at the county's waste transfer station. Old parts are sometimes traded through area scrap dealers and occasionally, new parts are purchased.
Rosenkrantz said he looks forward to many more years of working in the new space, which is filled with stacks of computer processing units, piles of monitors, bins of digital video cards and thousands of other pieces of equipment.
"I'm just awed by the sheer magnitude of the size of the facility and what it can do," he said. "It makes me humble, you know, because I never expected it, I never dreamt of it and I never planned for it — we just sort of grew and I reacted to the situation and here we are."
