Seeking Greater Positive Impact in Helping People:

New United Way $100 million investment plan highlights initiatives, new organizations; ties traditional funds to specific community goals

BOSTON – After more than two years of intense review, analysis, and direct coordination with volunteers, community leaders and over 126 agencies in the community, United Way of Massachusetts Bay and Merrimack Valley (UWMB/MV) today announced a $100 million, three-year plan that seeks to produce the greatest, positive impact for the community in the organization’s history.

The new strategy promises to improve the quality of life for the region’s children and families by tying United Way investments to specific community goals and measurements, which the agencies funded have pledged to meet. The plan focuses United Way investments on promoting school readiness, supporting youth so they graduate with meaningful options for the future, helping families earn sustaining wages and ending family homelessness.

“Our success will be measured not by campaign dollars raised and individual program outcomes but by whether these community goals are met,” said Robert M. Mahoney, chair of the Board of Directors at United Way of Massachusetts Bay and Merrimack Valley. “This multi-year strategy brings to life our commitment to make this region the best place for children in the country. Solutions, like ending family homelessness and promoting school readiness, are not out of reach if we target our investments into a network of agencies working toward shared, measurable goals. This plan is about really knitting together a coordinated effort to move the needle on the issues facing our communities.”

The move represents a major shift in how United Way funds its affiliate agencies and responds to directives from United Way’s Board, volunteers and donors to deliver a more meaningful return on community investments. United Way remains one of the only local organizations that provides agencies with unrestricted operating support; many funders invest only in specific programs. With this change, United Way is pioneering an approach that combines the flexibility of providing unrestricted operating support to agencies with the accountability of expecting them to achieve specific contributions to measurable community goals.

Under the new strategy, United Way is planning to continue its investments of approximately $34 million per year for the next three years in the regions served by the organization and remains committed to ensuring the basic needs of children and families are met. In addition to providing unrestricted operating support to its existing network of agencies, the first year of the plan shifts $1 million to invest in 16 organizations that currently do not receive United Way funding. These organizations cement United Way’s commitment to helping more individuals earn family-sustaining wages by acquiring employment- and finance-related skills and increasing access to safe, affordable and permanent housing.

For example, Father Bill’s Place in Quincy will receive funding for the first time to advance its cutting-edge work with homeless families, Crittenton Women’s Union will receiving funding to support its work to move women and families toward economic independence, and the Massachusetts Association of Community Development Corporations will receive funding to support micro-enterprise and small business development, especially by people of color.

The plan also includes $6.1 million to drive existing UWMB/MV initiatives like Today’s Girls Tomorrow’s Leaders, its award-winning effort on programs for girls and, Dream in Science, an innovative after-school program to foster math, science and technology among 4 th, 5 th and 6 th graders. These funds will also seed new efforts in the coming year to address youth violence and advance United Way’s Housing First initiative, which aims to move homeless families into permanent housing as quickly as possible. United Way worked closely with its agencies in early 2006 to explain that it would be shifting a percentage of funds to these efforts and to new organizations.

This shift to proportional funding based on how agency programs contribute to United Way measurements will affect the traditional allocations of the agencies in United Way’s network. Increases and decreases in agency investments will be phased in over three years; in the first year, United Way is recommending a transition funding plan to give agencies more time to plan for funding adjustments. In the second and third years of this new program, some agency allocations will go up, and some will go down compared to the previous formula. When viewed in total, however, the full amount of funds raised by the UWMB/MV will have a larger impact.

Because of United Way’s commitment to minimizing first-year decreases to some of its agencies, and because it has shifted funds from its traditional operating support pool to increase support for new organizations and its initiatives, all affiliated agencies will receive decreases in the first year. Many of the same organizations receiving operating support from United Way will have an opportunity to apply for United Way initiative funding over the course of the next fiscal year.

“This shift reflects our realization that we needed to dramatically change our investment strategy to reach the research-based community goals we believe will enable our region to thrive,” said Milton J. Little, Jr., president and chief executive officer at UWMB/MV. “This has to be about the community, not individual agencies. While all our existing affiliate agencies are excellent organizations doing important work, some are in a better position to deliver outcomes that align with our long-term community goals. This year’s transition period will allow United Way to set the stage for significant boosts in funding for these aligned agencies.”

United Way’s plan aims to build a better quality of life for the region by focusing on four major areas of community need. Investments in the first year will include:

• $10.9 million to provide youth with consistent, supportive adult relationships and productive out-of-school time programs to help them graduate as capable and involved young adults;
• $5.3 million to ensure more young children will be healthy and ready to succeed in school, by providing families and early childhood professionals with more support to understand and nurture the unique needs of young children;
• $3.3 million to help more individuals earn family-sustaining wages by acquiring employment- and finance-related skills;
• $4 million to increase access to safe, affordable and permanent housing, by prioritizing a “Housing First” model of combating homelessness, and by expanding opportunities for families to build critical financial assets; and
• $2 million to support basic needs, by providing immediate assistance to individuals in financial crises, such as emergency food, clothing & shelter, information and referral services.

The plan, which is consistent with a national United Way strategy, is the result of a two-year process that included meetings and discussions about agencies’ potential to contribute to United Way’s specific community goals. UWMB issued a Request for Proposals (RFP) in November of 2006 that reflects its new approach. The RFP review process involved more than 75 community leaders, volunteers, and donors in addition to United Way staff. The goals of the new approach include investing in communities of greatest need, addressing gaps in service and geography and encouraging innovation and rewarding success. United Way will do more than measure results at the end of three years – it will monitor the progress of its investment partners and distribute learnings and best practices to help partner organizations meet their goals.

The United Way’s Board of Directors approved the new strategy yesterday, and the more targeted approach will be implemented for the fiscal year 2008, which begins July 1. As part of the merger agreement last fall between United Way of Massachusetts Bay and United Way of Merrimack Valley, the FY08 investment strategy for Merrimack Valley organizations remains unchanged.