United Way of the Greater Capital Region Awards $787,000 in Grants to Empower 35 Community-Based Organizations
In its latest round of Focused Investments, the nonprofit leader will collaborate with its partners to improve conditions for families and individuals across the Capital Region.
September 10, 2024 (Albany, NY) – United Way of the Greater Capital Region (UWGCR) is providing $787,000 in grants to 35 community-based organizations, furthering its commitment to working with its nonprofit partners to build a community where all have the conditions and opportunities needed to thrive. UWGCR’s leaders announced the new round of funding and rolled out its updated Community Impact strategy during a press conference at its headquarters at The Blake Annex in Downtown Albany Tuesday morning. UWGCR’s latest investment in the local community includes funding for its six Family Neighborhood Resource Centers (FNRCs) and 29 Focused Investment partners.
“In the Capital Region, nearly 40% of our friends and neighbors live below the ALICE (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed) threshold and struggle to afford basic necessities like nutrition, housing, health care, and childcare,” said Peter Gannon, UWGCR’s President & CEO. “By strengthening our community through Focused Investments, United Way is committed to working with our partners to ensure every local family and individual has access to the programs and services they need most.”
Totaling $555,000 each of the next two years, Focused Investments represent UWGCR’s largest individual grant category. The grants are unrestricted, empowering nonprofits to utilize the funds however they best see fit. The funds are structured around United Way’s three key impact areas of Financial Security, Healthy Community, and Youth Opportunity. Within these categories, UWGCR has identified six key outcomes it’s working to achieve in partnership with local organizations.
Financial Security
- Enhance workforce development for the “whole worker”
- Promote financial inclusion and asset building for ALICE families and individuals
Healthy Community
- Improve women’s health
- Advance nutritional security
Youth Opportunity
- Improve youth mental health
- Strengthen childhood development, literacy and STEAM skills
For the first time ever, United Way is splitting its Focused Investments into two parallel categories. Six local organizations, known as Hammerstone Partners, will receive $35,000 per year for the next two years. The remaining 23 organizations, known as Bedrock Partners, will each receive $15,000 per year for the next two years. In addition to funding, UWGCR offers strategic support like data capacity and sharing, convening groups and leaders from different sectors for collaboration, and evaluation to determine how well stakeholders are delivering on long-term goals.
“UWGCR believes in making the Capital Region the best place to live, work, and play for all people. To this end we are working to tackle unfairness and injustice and create the conditions in which each and every one of us has what we need to thrive,” UWGCR Chief Impact Officer Claire Reid said. “The Impact sector is a critical force in making that possible. By funding a diversity of efforts across the Capital Region, we seek to support the equitable meeting of basic needs and rights, while working to uplift and build power with our community members, in particular those who are most disadvantaged by existing systems.”
Listed below, the six Hammerstone Partners each have a history of demonstrating a systems perspective in their missions, actively engaging in work that has the potential to fundamentally transform the long-standing conditions that hold problems in place. With clear plans for how to achieve their goals, these partners collaborate with UWGCR to take a knowledge-based approach to their work.
Hammerstone Partners ($35,000 per year)
- CanCode Communities
- Connect Center
- C.R.E.A.T.E. Community Studios
- Jewish Family Services of Northeastern New York
- Schoharie River Center
- SEAT Center
"Jewish Family Services is honored to be a Hammerstone partner to address the youth and teen mental health crisis through innovation, collaboration and community cooperation," said Jane Ginsburg, Executive Director of Jewish Family Services of NENY.
“The SRC is proud and honored to be partnering with the United Way of the Greater Capital Region and our other community partners through the Hammerstone Grant program, that will help initiate the Schenectady Environmental Education Center and create a city-wide, systemic program to engage youth and their families in a focused effort to raise our community's level of environmental literacy and promote greater knowledge of the emergent environmental issues and health concerns impacting our community,” said John McKeeby, Executive Director of the Schoharie River Center. “United Way’s funding and guidance is critical to our shared goal to create a community where all members have the knowledge to act, and the agency to pursue and enact more environmentally sustainable lives, career paths and public policies.”
UWGCR’s investment also includes a combined $232,000 to its six Family Neighborhood Resource Centers (FNRCs), which meet the diverse needs of families by offering an array of services under one roof. The six FNRC partners are Columbia Opportunities (Columbia County), Community Action of Greene County (Greene County), Mechanicville Area Community Services Center (Saratoga County), Schenectady Community Action Program (Schenectady County), Schoharie County Community Action Program (Schoharie County), and Trinity Alliance of the Capital Region (Albany Country).
“United Way of the Greater Capital Region is visionary in its support of neighborhood based innovative comprehensive strategies to strengthen vulnerable families through the FNRC network,” Trinity Alliance CEO Harris Oberlander said.
UWGCR's 23 Bedrock Partners (listed below) are a group of trusted community-based organizations with a proven history of delivering essential services and making a lasting impact in their local communities. Through these grants, United Way is investing in their mission, vision, and approach.
“Our partnership with United Way of the Greater Capital Region empowers us to address systemic racism and promote food sovereignty in the 518,” Soul Fire Farm Co-Executive Director Cheryl Whilby said. “This grant supports our work in neighborhoods like Albany’s South End, West Hill, Arbor Hill, and North Troy to increase access to quality food and heal historical injustices, fostering equity and resilience in our communities.”
“Upper Hudson Planned Parenthood is deeply grateful for our partnership with United Way of the Greater Capital Region. Their bedrock support has allowed us to expand our Menopause Care services to all three of our health centers, ensuring access to this critical care for historically underserved communities,” said Chelly Hegan, President & CEO of Upper Hudson Planned Parenthood. “With their help, we will train our providers and clinic staff, broaden our services, and promote this new offering within our community.”
Bedrock Partners ($15,000 per year)
CAPTAIN Community Human Services
Columbia County Recovery Kitchen
Frank Chapman Memorial Institute
Mission Accomplished Transition Services
Radix Ecological Sustainability Center