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United Way Makes Year-End Community Investments |
Char-Em United Way has made a special community allocation investment to meet critical needs. Over $33,000 from United Way’s Emergency Needs Fund has just been awarded to several local agencies.
Good Samaritan Family Services, Northwest Michigan Community Action Agency, and the Salvation Army have all received grants earmarked specifically for emergency utility assistance and energy conservation, and eviction/foreclosure avoidance. In addition, grants have been made to two innovative new programs. These include the Early Childhood Mental Health Initiative, being coordinated by the Health Department of Northwest Michigan and a new “Food 4 Kids Backpack Program” initiated by the Manna Food Bank. This will provide weekend food for children who depend upon the school breakfast and lunch programs for a majority of their meals.
“We are very pleased to be able to provide additional funding at this time,” says Therese Green, Chair of United Way’s Allocation Committee. “During last spring’s Community Investment Allocation process, we set aside a small percentage of the available funds into an Emerging Needs Fund. This fund gives us flexibility to meet community needs that might arise in between our annual investment cycle.”
“The Emerging Needs Fund was conceived to meet new needs or to fund promising new solutions to existing needs, and the grants for the mental health and food programs are a good fit for that goal,” continued Green. “The United Way Board of Directors again felt that providing immediate support to the many families facing financial crises continued to be an important use of the majority of the funds.”
The funds have been made available to all agencies immediately, and the utility and shelter services will be provided to residents of both Charlevoix and Emmet Counties within the next three months.
“We were able to provide this special funding because we had such a successful campaign last year,” says Martha Lancaster, United Way Executive Director. “Last year we raised a record amount of funds and this enabled us to invest a record amount of money back into the community. As the community need is greater than ever, we hope that we will be able to maintain this level of investment again this year. However, that will only be possible if we reach our current campaign goal of $350,000. Our campaign now stands at 80% of goal, and we still have a long way to go to meet that mark.”
The Frey Foundation has offered United Way a challenge grant of an additional $20,000 if it meets the campaign goal this year. Contributions to the campaign can be sent to Char-Em United Way, P O Box 1701, Petoskey MI 49770 or made on line at www.charemunitedway.org, selecting the “Give” button.
For more information, contact United Way at 231-487-1006 or info@charemunitedway.org.
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