United Way

Greater Kansas City United Way (GKCUW) will be kicking off their 2011 campaign on September 8^th. Hope House is proud to be a United Way partner agency. We recognize the good work done through United Way, and we will be involved in the campaign as well.

2011 United Way Campaign Focus

For this year’s campaign, GKCUW will focus on education, income and health.

• Education strategies will focus on helping children and youth attain their full potential.
•  Income strategies are helping people achieve financial independence and stability.
• Health strategies are focused on helping people and their neighborhoods to be safe, healthy and thriving.
• All strategies are focused on ensuring that people in Greater Kansas City have all the building blocks for a good life.

How United Way Helps Hope House

We do our part to work with United Way to ensure they have a successful campaign. If their campaign is successful, then the agencies they fund will be more successful as well.

Approximately 6% of our budget comes from United Way, funding our shelter and our therapeutic services. We agree with United Way that when people are safe they have a better chance of being healthy and thriving.

How Hope House Helps United Way

Our partnership includes participating in the United Way Day of Caring and assisting with the campaign. We have our own internal campaign with our staff members and we will go out to the community to talk with other businesses. If your company doesn’t do an internal campaign I encourage you to start one this year.

If your business does a United Way campaign, you can request a speaker from Hope House. We would be honored to come to your place of work to talk about what we do and how your dollars help us meet our goals. If you’re interested, please contact Gretchen at gschmitz@hopehouse.net or 816-257-9342.

IT’S UNITED WAY TIME

United Way kicked off its fundraising campaign on September 8 at the Westin Crown Center. It is now campaign time for companies and partnering United Way agencies. UW is working hard to make sure that agencies have the resources available to provide the critical services being offered in our area. Hope House is proud to be a partner agency with United Way and will work hard to ensure that the campaign is successful.

Hope House receives approximately 6% of our budget from United Way. This is through the allocation process and from those donors that designate their giving to our agency. It is imperative that the campaign is successful so that agencies like Hope House can continue to receive the crucial funding for our programs.

United Way has gone through many changes over the past couple of years and is truly committed to making change happen in our community. The changes have been positive and thoughtful and will positively impact our community.

If you work for a company that does a United Way campaign, congratulations - you are making a difference. If you are not, please consider starting a workplace campaign.  United Way makes it easy, and agencies like Hope House are available to visit your workplace and present information about our programs and what being a partner with United Way means for our agency. 

Funding For Hope House

With the news of potential 50% funding cuts from the state of Missouri, many questions have been asked about our funding so I thought I would take this opportunity to address that in this blog.

We receive revenues from public and private sources. Our public funding consists of grant funding from city, county, state and federal government sources and accounts for 42% of our overall funding. We are very proud to be United Way partner agency, with 5% of our budget coming from United Way. Our private funding comes from individuals, businesses, service organizations, churches and special events, and is the remaining 53% of our budget.

INNOVATIVE PARTNERSHIPS

We have worked hard to diversify our funding so that a downturn in one area won’t significantly impact or cripple our budget. This has not been easy; however, we recognize its importance and will continue to strive toward this goal. In the past two years, cuts in funding from public sources have forced us to add to our private fundraising expectations. We have worked to create funding sources that are sustainable and “economy proof”. One way we are accomplishing this is through innovative partnerships. I am happy to share two examples.

BEST VALUE THRIFT STORES

The first partnership is with Best Value Thrift Stores. Best Value collects donated items on behalf of Hope House to sell in their thrift stores. In exchange, Hope House receives a monthly remittance resulting from the sale of donated items. This partnership creates a guaranteed annual compensation of nearly $100,000 in support of Hope House programs and operations! If you are interested in having items picked up from your home, please call 816.554.0870.

GLOBAL RE-SOURCE FUNDING

Another partnership is with Global Re-source Funding. For every inkjet, toner/laser cartridge, digital camera, GPS device, iPod, laptop and cell phone that is collected and donated to Hope House, Global Re-Source Funding will send a donation to Hope House for the full buyback value of the product as it is recycled for re-sale. Global Re-Source Funding will supply collection bins plus pick-up services and marketing materials for your program – all at no cost.

The best part of this program is that you can raise money to support Hope House simply by asking for a donation of items that most people discard anyway. To learn more or to enroll in this partnership please visit http://www.globalre-sourcefunding.com/.

CONTINUING TO STRIVE

We will continue to strive to meet the challenge of serving over 10,000 victims of domestic violence every year by exploring new and lasting ways to bring in sustainable revenue. Please let us know if you have partnership ideas or if you would like to make a donation that will support our services. You can visit http://www.hopehouse.net/ for more information.