Recap from United Way's 2022 Community Breakfast
On Wednesday, October 5, over 240 partners, advocates, and community leaders gathered at Venue 252 for United Way of Lane County’s Community Breakfast. This event, the first Community Breakfast since 2019, was an opportunity to hear about United Way’s impact around Lane County and connect with other advocates passionate about kids’ success.
This year, we were proud to feature Angela F. Williams, United Way Worldwide’s President & CEO, as our keynote speaker. Angela shared an inspiring message about the strength of the United Way network and importance of working together (you can watch her full 18-minute keynote address here).
“There is not a problem here... that can’t be solved with the people sitting in this room, if there is a will.... So we have to lead, together.”
Angela F. Williams sharing the keynote speech at United Way’s 2022 Community Breakfast
PARTNER STORIES
Following Angela’s empowering keynote, we heard from three local partners that have received United Way support in the last few years. First, Lacey Joy and Lane Tompkins from McKenzie School District shared about the dire need for child care in McKenzie River.
“The McKenzie River is a child care desert,” said Lacey. “Within the school district boundaries, which is approximately 42 miles, there is not one licensed child care provider.” With United Way funding, the McKenzie School District has been able to propose a child care center with space for up to 60 children ages three months to six years old. “As a resident and a mom, I have dealt first hand with the lack of child care, and can tell you how frustrating it is, and what a strain the unpredictability can be on a family… The center will provide the opportunity for residents to re-enter the workforce following Covid-19 and the [Holiday Farm] wildfire, knowing that they’ll have reliable child care.” The space will also provide office space to community partners to meet and provide services to families in the area. The McKenzie Little Eagles Preschool Program is slated to open in February of 2023.
Angela F. Williams (far left) and Noreen Dunnells, United Way of Lane County’s President & CEO (far right) pose for a picture with Noreen’s daughter and friend at United Way’s 2022 Community Breakfast.
Next, Megan Shultz from 15th Night, one of United Way’s recent Transformation Grant recipients, shared about the impact that United Way support had on understanding how to solve an issue as large and complex as youth homelessness in Lane County. “By removing barriers to access to school-based resources for all students, 15th Night would be helping our primary focus, which is the 500+ unaccompanied students in 4J, Bethel, and Springfield, who are navigating school, life, and homelessness on their own.”
“With United Way Transformation funding, here is what we’ve learned: food and mental health are top priority needs in every high school that we’ve been in; that most staff and students don’t know what their school-based resources are or how to access them; given the opportunity, students have the solutions, we just need to listen to them; and that the community wants to be a part of those solutions.”
We are proud to continue supporting 15th Night and their partners as a recipient of one of our newest grant cycles, the Community Change Coalition grants, as a partner of the “Addressing Gaps in Food Access” Coalition, led by FOOD for Lane County.
Lastly, Ana Day and Nicolle Kuhn of Oregon Community Programs shared their experiences and takeaways as participants of Project Impact. Project Impact is a cohort-based impact evaluation series that United Way has been hosting with our partners from Dialogues in Action since 2019. Oregon Community Programs chose to evaluate their foster parent training and support program. OCP’s involvement in Project Impact led to several key findings that showed the efficacy of their programs, and how they can continue to improve.
“Professional foster parents can be grown, not just found. What do we mean by that? We mean that foster parents don’t come pre-loaded with all the skills and abilities they need to provide outstanding treatment to the kids in their care. They learn on the job, and with the right coaching, they become more skillful and more effective over time.”
Alma Fumiko Hesus (United Way of Lane County), Miles Pendleton (Eugene/Springfield NAACP), Demond Hawkins (Trillium Community Health Plan), and Leilani Brewer (PacificSource) at United Way’s 2022 Community Breakfast
“We are so grateful for the opportunity to more closely examine our programming and the impact that we're having with our work. Not only that, but the process was built to train our team on how to do program evaluation on our own, so we are looking forward to choosing another target for 2023.”
“YOU ALL ARE LEADERS IN THIS COMMUNITY; YOU ALL ARE INFLUENCERS”
Campaign Chair Andy Fernandez reminded us of the influence that we each have in the community. Working together, our collective impact can create lasting change for kids and families in Lane County.
Join us as we work to shape an equitable future for all.
“As the United Way, we see our role in the community as being a connector and a convener. When we are at our best, we are connecting the passion of donors and volunteers with the impact that our mission-driven nonprofit partners are creating every day in the lives of kids and families in Lane County. When we are at our best, we’re helping to bring people together to tackle challenges that are too big for any one organization or anyone one program to tackle alone.”
Watch United Way’s 2022 Community Breakfast below:
