Better way to use helper function in controller
It turns out that the accepted answer that I read on Stack Overflow was not the best answer.  The way that I was using was the same thing as the first thing that @cg505 did.  It allowed the function to be called when the controller was being a controller.  Using this method maintains DRY and prevents it from being called when the controller is being a controller (i.e. it is the same as if it was below the line `private`).