United Way reports on 2006 community impact

CHENANGO COUNTY – Over the last year, the United Way has been reforming its programs in an effort to increase accountability to the community. As part of that process, the organization recently released its 2006 End of Year Community Impact Report.

The United Way began the new program in 2006, asking community organizations to submit applications requesting the program funding they wanted. The applications were looked over by a team of volunteers and graded based on their content and the proposed benefit to the community. Once funding was distributed, the United Way began working to guarantee that the goals proposed in the initial application had been met.

“It’s important for the community to understand we’re collecting data and holding the organizations responsible. We’ve compared the actual data to what the group said they were going to achieve. The results were surprisingly good,” said United Way Executive Director Elizabeth Monaco.

For 2006, the United Way collected both mid-year and end of year reports, and according to Monaco, the mid-year reports left room for improvement. Julie Heymans, an intern from Colgate University, met with the organizations, collected the data and explained where improvements could be made. “The end of year reports showed a dramatic improvement,” said Monaco. “A good percentage of organizations exceeded the goals they originally set.”

Organizations in the four focus areas – opportunities for children and youth, poverty issues of housing and hunger, the aging population and access to health care – exceeded their initial goals. In the area of opportunities for children and youth, organizations like the PAL Family Resource Center, provided by the Mothers and Babies Perinatal Network far exceeded their initial goals. Originally, PAL hoped that 140 parents would attend classes and programs at the PAL Center and 120 of them would say they felt more confident in their parenting skills after attending. The organization actually saw 215 parents and had 100 percent say they felt more confident. In addition they had 57 new families register and begin utilizing the PAL Center.