United Way of Weld County: What We Really Do

According to Melanie Woolman, President & CEO United Way of Weld County (UWWC):  “United Way is often a mystery to people, with a lot of community members being unsure about what it is we do. The reason for that is because we are a complex, ever-changing organization that responds to community need. Responding to community need is the key here – we fill gaps, and step in when no other organization has the capacity to do so. This has made our work hard to understand, and that’s why Melanie is participating in our June 7th  Northern Colorado Women in Business Workshop –  to debunk the myths about what UWWC does.

Encouraging healthy lifestyles, teaching life skills, and improving mental health for youth through recreation, is one example.  United Way’s Recreation Scholarship Program, enables nearly 1,000 youth to participate in child and youth development, recreational and sport activities through their local recreation centers plus county-wide programs – otherwise, most could not afford to be engaged.

Meet OUR SPEAKER:
Melanie was born and raised in Rochester, New York. She earned dual BA degrees in international relations and political science from Canisius College, a Jesuit institution, in Buffalo, New York.

Before becoming the United Way of Weld County President & CEO, she was the Vice President of Community impact and oversaw the programmatic life of the organization. She’s held other roles at United Way, beginning with a year of service as an AmeriCorps member focusing on community-wide capacity building to end homelessness in Weld County.

She embraces the Jesuit ideal of being “men and women for and with others” and embodies it in her day-to-day work. Melanie and her husband David live in Evans and have one daughter, Phoebe. They enjoy spending time with family, going on walks, and gardening.

You can contact Melanie and learn more about her at:

Melanie Woolman
United Way of Weld County
814 9^th St. Greeley, CO 80631
www.unitedway-weld.org
mwoolman@unitedway-weld.org or 970-217-8207
https://www.linkedin.com/in/melanie-woolman/

Kristi shared your member survey results from last summer with Melanie. Members asked:

How can I get more involved in our community? / What Volunteer Opportunities are available? / What are we doing to help Homeless people? / Where can struggling citizens find housing assistance? /How do we learn more about local nonprofits? / How can I make a difference in my community? / How can we help children get their best start in LIFE! / What does local philanthropy look like in Weld County?
We will attempt to explore all of these items.

UWWC invests in and focuses on 5 key initiative areas:

• • Reading Great by 8 (early childhood)
  • Thrive by 25 (youth success)
  • Weld’s Way Home (preventing and ending homelessness)
  • Aging Well (older adults and healthy aging)
  • Connecting Weld (access to services)

We make substantial investments in all of these areas. Some of those investments are internal and some are external.

• • External: funding programs at other nonprofits
  • Internal: 211, the Diaper Bank, the Housing Navigation Center, etc.
  • A lot of times this also takes the form of providing our own staff to do work on behalf of other organizations. For example, during the pandemic we became the fiscal agent for over a dozen smaller organizations to access over $3 million in federal COVID response dollars. Without us lending our finance team to this effort those dollars could not have come to Weld County and thus not helped our most vulnerable neighbors.
  • We also facilitate community-wide conversations in these areas and do strategic planning on behalf of all of Weld County in these initiative areas.

Three key points you will gain & take away following this Workshop.

1. United Way of Weld County is all about connecting – we connect clients to needed services (either our own services offered or those of our partner agencies), we connect nonprofits to resources to help them accomplish their goals, we connect volunteers to meaningful opportunities and we connect donors to causes they care about.
2. We don’t ever do anything without the community asking us to – the two perfect examples are the work that we do in the early childhood world (Reading Great by 8) and housing and homelessness (Weld’s Way Home). These two efforts seem vastly different but the common thread between the two is that the community asked UWWC to do work in both of those areas. Community stakeholders and leaders asked UWWC to get involved in and provide direct services in each of these areas.
3. We cannot do any of this without the generosity of our community – generosity of both time and money. It certainly takes money to make this happen, but it also takes time. Volunteering your time is just as impactful as spending your time with the neighbor kid.

Thank our Workshop Volunteers for giving YOU a fabulous experience:
WORKSHOP Date: Wednesday, June 7, 2023
Catering: Nick & Ashley St. George, Corleon’s
Set-up DIVA Tuesday, June 6^th – Rose Esparza, Rose’s Professional Massage Therapy; Donna Upton, Wearable Technology, Barb Wasung, CPA/Community Grief Center; Shannon Churgin, Senior Insurance Sales/One Hope Wine
Check-in Hostesses: Margie Martinez, UWWC / Kiwanis / Rodeo Queens; Flo Mikkelson, 50AndBetterTravel.com / RSVP
Greeter: June Lemmings, June’s TEAM Powered by Keller Williams & Rachaelle Gamache, Esthebella Skin Care
Speaker’s Gift: Kate Howell, RE/MAX Alliance
3:00 minute-7^th Inning Stretch:  Crystal Scolaro, Sears Real Estate
Clean-up DIVAS: Jaymi Nickell, State Farm Ins / Academy of Las Animas Online School; Linda Moore, Care Giver; Trista Ells, Stoddard Funeral Home; Ami Schott, Resource Center for Pregnancy & Personal Health; Cyndi Kurtz, Habitat for Humanity & ReStore

Sister-to-Sister Pay-it-Forward: Will benefit United Way of Weld County and be coordinated by Alexa Helpler, Commercial Interiors by JOF. Your collaborative donation will go to support people across the life-span, from pre-birth all the way through end of life. Or, if you choose, you can direct that donation to something more specific, like the work that UWWC does in the early childhood realm. Either way, because of our Cornerstone partners (who cover our administrative and fundraising costs) all of the money that NorCoWIB members contribute goes directly to serving people in Weld County.