Privacy Policy

The Upper Swan Valley Historical Society (USVHS) is committed to respecting privacy. This privacy policy governs our collection and use of personal and business information collected from members and visitors to our website, through our email and regular mail correspondence, telephone calls, and faxes, and reflects our policies toward privacy in respect to all other means of gathering and disseminating data.

Our policy is to use any and all data collected by any means, whether through the internet, email, our online database and/or any interactive forms or surveys only for such uses that are important to our organization and our cause, in light of the professional standards required and expected from nonprofit organizations.

USVHS reserves the right to change this policy whenever deemed necessary without prior notification. Should changes be made, they will be posted on this Privacy Notice with the date of revision.

Information posted about our members on the website consists only of name and city. We do, however, maintain internal lists of members and contacts. Because your physical mail and e-mail addresses are confidential, we never share either type of list with outside parties, and only key USVHS personnel and certain technical contractors are granted access to these lists. Lists are accessed only for the purpose of upgrading our computer systems or distributing USVHS newsletters, publicity campaigns, alerts, correspondence, event notifications, or other professional communications that help us accomplish our mission as a nonprofit organization.

Visitors to the Website and Website Security

The USVHS' website collects information about each visitor to our website in these ways:

1.   through your IP address

2.   through cookies

3.   through online forms for surveys, events, and purchasing merchandise.

4.   through any correspondence you send us via mail to our online posted mailing address, our online listed emails, and through other forms not associated with the database.

Detail about these methods of information collection follows:

IP Addresses

Your IP address does not reveal any personal information about you or your activities. Our web server host logs all IP addresses of all visitors to automate information collection concerning web traffic, usage, length of time visitors stayed, new visitors, entry and exit points, and the like. It is also used as statistical information for reporting and to find ways to improve web usability.

Cookies

Our website uses cookies to gather information about traffic and to enhance your visit to our site. A cookie is:

"HTTP cookies (also called web cookies, Internet cookies, browser cookies, or simply cookies) are small blocks of data created by a web server while a user is browsing a website and placed on the user's computer or other device by the user's web browser. Cookies are placed on the device used to access a website, and more than one cookie may be placed on a user's device during a session."

Definition from Wikipedia at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_cookie accessed 3/19/2023.

Cookies are used to customize web pages to provide the user with preferences. They can be deactivated in your browser if you wish by configuring your browser's preferences not to accept them. No information gathered by any cookies we have on our site is used to disseminate information about your personal use of the Internet, nor is it ever used for any marketing or advertising purposes.

Online Forms

Online forms are generated by our database to gather information about you and/or your organization when you register for an event, complete a survey or to purchase merchandise. None of this information is shared with 3rd parties, except that which is intended to be shown on results pages as delineated on the form. If you post information that is available on the web, and wish to have it removed or corrected, please contact us at info@swanvalleyhistoricalsociety.org and we will comply with your request as soon as possible.

Correspondence

None of your contact information or any of your correspondence that you send via regular mail, online through forms, through email, or any other means is ever sold to third parties under any circumstances, and is used only to conduct our daily business in accomplishing our mission under our policies as a nonprofit entity.

USVHS Sharing Practices

None of the information we collect is shared with any 3rd-party except as aggregated statistics for organizational performance reporting purposes, capturing and defining web traffic patterns, and website improvement. Information of this kind is never used to track or monitor individual users. Our purpose is to improve the information flow to USVHS members, the community, and to improve the content and usability of our website, programs, products, and services.

If you send us questions about our website content or any of our areas of operation, we may forward your request for information to parties who would be able to assist you, or we may respond to you with that information in kind. You may at any time request us not to do so, and we will comply with that request, except as we are required by legal regulations or a court order to do so. It is unlikely we will contact you for verification, but we reserve the right to do so, should it become necessary. If you contact us by email or phone, we may ask you to verify your personal information so that we may respond to your inquiry with an assurance of your identity.

Our database is protected by security put in place to safeguard data integrity and to prevent unauthorized access and/or use of its systems. These security measures have been designed to provide the user with reasonable protection of private information entrusted to our possession.

Opt In/Opt Out of USVHS Email Announcements

Sign up for USVHS email announcement by contacting us at info@swanvalleyhistoricalsociety.org. Once you are part of our contact/distribution lists, you can opt out any time you like by contacting USVHS at info@swanvalleyhistoricalsociety.org or by calling (406) 754-2745.

Links to Other Websites

Although we work hard to make sure we are linking to appropriate sites, and take full responsibility for the content of our site and our own privacy policy, we are not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of sites to which we link.

Online Surveys

Occasionally we may ask you to participate in online surveys in the interest of accomplishing our mission. Such surveys are always on a volunteer basis, and it is not necessary for you to fill it out. Should you decide to fill a survey out, the types of information that are collected may include demographics such as zip codes, age group, services received or provided, etc. However, none of this information will be collected on any one individual or that can be used to identify any one individual. Survey information is used in the aggregate to improve our organizational and online services.

Corrections to Personal Information

If your personal or your organization's information needs to be updated, contact us at info@swanvalleyhistoricalsociety.org or by calling (406) 754-2238.

Online Purchases

USVHS may provide you with links to affiliate sites to allow you to purchase items related to historical subject matter and activities. Any transaction conducted as a result of those links is not conducted on our site, but is conducted on the site of the seller or the company managing the transaction through their online ecommerce functions. Therefore, USVHS does not either see or collect any personal information about you, your transaction, and/or your credit card. All transactions and transaction details are between the purchaser and the company, and USVHS makes no guarantee about these transactions. Buyers are responsible to be fully informed about sellers' and/or companies managing online transactions policies, and will hold USVHS harmless of all disputes between the buyer and the seller/transaction management company. Should USVHS offer products and services for online purchase directly on USVHS' website in the future, USVHS will update this policy as necessary.

Contacting Us

If you believe that your personal and/or private information is being used for a purpose other than its intended purpose, or if you have any questions about our Privacy Policy or the practices of our site, contact USVHS at (406) 754-2745.