Steamboat Pilot & Today

Steamboat Springs — Sheriff John Warner has been raising bail money in case he gets locked up next week.

He has called friends, family and others asking for donations to raise $1,050 in bail money for the Muscular Dystrophy Association's Lock-Up, the organization's largest fund-raiser.

More than 70 businessmen and women from Steamboat Springs will participate in the MDA Lock-Up, which takes place from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. July 31.

The participants will be picked up by an Alpine Luxury Limousine and transported to the Rio Grande Mexican Restaurant, where they will have their mug shots taken and be locked up for one hour of phone labor. They must call whomever they can to raise bail, which was set at $1,050 per person. That amount is enough to send two children with neuromuscular diseases to MDA Summer Camp in Empire at $525 each, Program Coordinator Brook Wilson said.

The project has operating costs, but Wilson said 76 percent of the proceeds go to MDA clinics at the Children's Hospital and University Hospital in Denver, assistance with wheelchairs and leg braces, MDA Summer Camp, research, and support groups. Muscular dystrophy affects nearly 1,700 families in Colorado, Wilson said.

Lunch for next week's fund-raiser will be provided by the Rio Grande, while the "jailbirds" make their calls. Some may stay for more than an hour and some may raise more than the set bail, Wilson said.

"This is a premier social event," Wilson said. "It's a good time. People get a great meal while they are raising money for a good cause."

Warner said his aunt died from muscular dystrophy a few years ago and that makes this fund-raiser more special to him.

"To watch her deteriorate was awful," said Warner, who has already raised more than enough money for bail. "It was unfortunate to learn about it this way, but it really hit home. I really consider it a worthwhile cause."

Waste Management salesman Luke Tellier will be at the Lock-Up.

He said he, too, lost friends to muscular dystrophy, which helped him realize that "if you have your health, you have everything."

Waste Management is paying $275 toward bail for Tellier and another employee participating in the Lock-Up.