Employee Ownership and Charity

Reaching a goal it had been pursuing since 2002, Torch Technologies, a technical services company in Alabama, announced that it had become 100% ESOP-owned. In an interesting twist, employees and others contributed over $1 million to charities in connection with the transaction. "When the ESOP transaction came about, we wanted shareholders to be aware of the opportunity to set aside a portion of their good fortune for charitable giving," CEO Bill Roark said. Torch Technologies' leadership followed the example of ESOP-owned Dynetics, where employees used company stock to make contributions of $3.2 million to a local charity.