MADDOCK – North Star Community Credit Union is reacting to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic with a three-tiered approach to helping its employees, its members and the communities it serves.

The credit union has 11 locations – Maddock, Bottineau, Butte, Cavalier, Grafton, Minot, Minot Air Force Base, Rugby, Tolna, Velva and Willow City.

Each of North Star’s nearly 100 employees received a $500 Pay It Forward cash bonus on Tuesday afternoon.

“Everyone’s situation is different but we are encouraging employees to Pay It Forward by sharing this bonus with someone who needs it,” said North Star President/CEO Bob Herrington.

Herrington has pledged his bonus to helping area families make rent payments due to loss of work.

North Star is also providing assistance to its members by offering no-hassle 90-day loan extensions, hardship loans for personal expenses and automatic $500 Visa credit limit increases to help members work through this difficult time.

“As a member-owned cooperative financial institution, we take every opportunity to serve our members, in good times and bad times. This is just one example of what makes credit unions different,” Herrington said.

To help benefit the local communities, North Star has allocated a $50,000 gift card budget to be used to purchase gift cards from local small businesses that are negatively impacted by closure or reduced hours because of the pandemic. These gift cards will then be given out to area groups such as health care workers, first responders, and teachers.

“Each recipient will have the option to keep the gift card or once again pay it forward to someone else,” Herrington said. “It is our hope that these programs will have a wide-ranging impact and that members with little or no negative impact will be in a position to help someone around them in need.”