Donating to the United Way is how we give back and build a stronger community. In the process, we help our friends and neighbors who are facing significant hurdles in their lives.
The fact is, the national economic recession has led to fewer federal and state dollars flowing through our South Sound communities. Nonprofits are being asked to shoulder a greater burden and are seeing a significant increase in the number of people who are asking for help from their community.
It’s through your generosity that those nonprofits supported by the United Way are able to feed the hungry, educate struggling students, shelter the homeless and help poor people on the brink of financial ruin pay their bills. We encourage a generous response from individuals and businesses when the United Way kicks off its annual campaign on Wednesday.
The statistics are troubling:
• One in four Thurston County youngsters don’t graduate from high school on time or at all.
• One in five third-graders in Thurston County are not reading at grade level.
• 6,100 children under 18 in Thurston County live in households that are under the federal poverty level.
• 1,100 people in Thurston County were homeless in January 2010.
• 13 percent of the adults in Thurston County have been unable to afford to see a doctor when they needed to.
• 20 percent of high school sophomores in Thurston County report they’ve skipped meals because their families didn’t have the money to feed them.
Those are sobering statistics for sure.
But that’s where the United Way – through the financial generosity of the community – steps up to reverse those trends.
Here’s how some of your United Way dollars have made a difference in the recent past:
• 120 children have been prepared for kindergarten through two early learning programs.
• 182 girls gained math and science skills and built up their self-esteem through one after-school program.
• Two youth empowerment programs successfully helped 300 teens improve academically and set future goals.
• 2,923 urgent dental care visits were provided to adults through a United-Way funded program.
• 83,008 nutritious meals were provided to seniors in their homes.
• 48,400 overnight shelter stays were provided by three local shelters.
The United Way does not achieve these remarkable accomplishments alone. The United Way partners with local nonprofits and through an incredible, volunteer-driven screening process that accepts funding applications. Those volunteers then weigh requests for dollars against community priorities and allocate funds directly to nonprofit programs.
What impresses us is the follow-through. Those same allocation committee members require the nonprofits to report back at six months, one year and 18 months to demonstrate how the community’s dollars have been used and whether mutually set goals have been met. Those nonprofits that don’t produce results can be – and are – defunded.
This is not the United Way of old, where 33 or so favored nonprofits got the same allocation of funds year after year. Today, the United Way invites competitive proposals, measures each application against community needs and follows through to ensure that donated dollars are achieving measurable results. The allocation process is much more transparent, accountable and matches dollars with emerging community needs.
Olympia School Board member Alan Miller and his wife, Dr. Maureen Callaghan, are chairing this year’s campaign, which kicks off Wednesday at the Thurston County Chamber of Commerce luncheon. Miller said its his goal to “throw the net wider” in hopes of drawing thousands of South Sound residents into the United Way family.
Committee chairwoman Carolyn Hardee, owner of Engineered Software, said she is amazed at the amount of good that can be done with United Way dollars. “We have a strong belief that the United Way can improve things in this community by bringing organizations together and making sure they are meeting community needs.”
How can people support the United Way?
• Host a United Way workplace campaign.
• Give through payroll deduction.
• Make a gift by check or cash.
• Give online at www.unitedway-thurston.org.
• Attend United Way events such as the Sept. 23 Day of Caring.
• Volunteer for a nonprofit in the community.
These are difficult financial times. More of our friends and neighbors are struggling. But the good news is, this is a generous community and those in need have a place to turn for help. The nonprofit organizations providing those much-needed services rely on United Way dollars to make ends meet.
Please be generous in this fall’s United Way campaign.
