Every three years I have the great honor of participating in our tri-annual grant making cycle at United Way. This process, which is led by my colleague Liz Fitzgerald, and our Community Investment Chair Jay Dinkel, is both gratifying and humbling. Jay and Liz work together with different panels of community investment volunteers, led by Deb Novotny, Bob Mack, and Mike Martinez. These panels consist of over 25 local volunteers who spend many hours pouring over grant proposals for programs in support of the health, education, and economic mobility of the 11 communities of Greater Nashua which we represent.

I will say at the outset that this is tough work. Each time we do this it seems like there are proposals for over twice as much funding as is available. So, there are many difficult decisions to be made. But the process is systematic and based on the objective criteria presented in our community needs assessment. In this year’s needs assessment, there were some poignant new trends which could be directly tied back to the pandemic, most especially related to the economic and mental health impacts of COVID. We are seeing an economy which is racked with high inflation, in particular effecting those in the lower rungs of the socio-economic ladder. Affordability of housing, food, fuel, transportation, and childcare continue to be significant barriers and call out for our attention. And the fallout of almost two years of “social distancing” and “hybrid / remote learning” have had a major impact on the mental health of everyone from school age children to home-bound seniors.

Through this lens, our volunteers waded into some 50 proposals and in the end made decisions to invest in 33 different programs from 26 different nonprofits. In this short column I won’t be able to go into all the details, so I will just describe a few of our new investments, the total of which represent $1,116,000 of grants to be fulfilled over the next three years.

In the realm of health, there are going to be 12 programs receiving funding from our all-important community safety net fund. These range from a program being run at the Nashua Senior Center to conduct free wellness clinics in conjunction with the Rivier School of Nursing, to a grant with the Caregivers to provide access to transportation and food resources, to the Child Advocacy Program run by the Granite State Children’s Alliance, to a new program supporting First Responders with Operation Delta Dog, to the Affordable Dental Care program at the Greater Nashua Dental Connection and the Crisis Intervention Program run by Bridges. Each of these programs and more are designed with measurable outcomes that we can (and will) assess over the next three years. When programs achieve their anticipated outcomes, our donors can know that the process of uplifting our community health is effective and successful.

To say that our educational system has been affected by the pandemic could be the understatement of the year! This area of focus contains 11 programs receiving $372K of funding over the next three years. Program investments include helping young children to receive wrap-around services, including mental health supports, connecting children and families to healthy approaches to nutrition (especially in challenging economic times), connecting families to high quality, affordable day care for the youngest kids, and supporting the development of healthy relationships and behaviors through one-to-one mentoring. Each of these programs, and collectively all the programs involved, will continue to help young people to be prepared to read at grade level and successfully graduate ready to become contributing and successful members of society. While these outcomes have always been important, in these COVID driven times we’ve seen a need to increase the level of investment in education and make sure that programs have the resources needed to be successful. We continue to see education as the great equalizer… the one investment that can change the trajectory of a person’s life forever and are proud to establish these grants.

And finally, economic mobility (or financial stability). These are the programs which focus on basic needs like food, clothing, and shelter, and are programs mostly designed to create a hand up in life. On the premise that we are all just that one life event away from falling through the cracks, it is important that we have a strong safety net. The 10 programs receiving funding this year, in amounts from $15K over 3 years to $75K over three years, include everything from transitional housing supports, to the construction of new housing with Habitat for Humanity, from workforce development of young homeless people at Stepping Stones, to community pop up food pantries in partnership with the Nashua Soup Kitchen, to giving our undivided attention to helping young people who might otherwise find themselves in the court system through programming at the Youth Council. It is our fervent goal and vision that we create a community in Greater Nashua where no person falls through the cracks and where each person has access to the building blocks of a good life… and these measurable and accountable programs form a keystone to accomplishing that goal.

Taken together, these $372,000 per year in community investments representing a crucial way our community creates a milieu… an environment… where success is achievable. These programs are designed to be equitable, and to be collaborative with each other. That model, which we call “collective impact,” is a cornerstone of our approach. Collective impact means that programs leverage each other’s expertise, skills, and resources. It makes them individually more effective and taken together more likely to achieve their goals.

I would like to applaud my colleagues and our volunteers for a hard job, well done. And to recognize all of you who are donors, large and small, in making this process even possible in the first place. The work speaks for itself, and it makes me incredibly proud to be able to participate, even if in a very small way. This work exemplifies everything about our mantra that GREAT THIGNS HAPPEN WHEN WE LIVE UNITED! Wishing you a wonderful Thanksgiving and joyous Holiday Season.

Mike Apfelberg is president of United Way of Greater Nashua.

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