It’s Something You Feel Good About

Heidi Nel has been a Washingtonian for only five weeks. She is still learning her way around the subway, the Safeway and the snow drifts.

But as of last Wednesday night, she is learning about another local institution—United Way of the National Capital Area.

Elise Shutzer, a colleague of hers at a political consulting firm, invited Heidi to attend a Young Leaders social hour at Marvin, a club near U Street. Heidi was not only impressed with the turnout (standing-room only after 45 minutes), but with what UWNCA does.

“I’ve heard of United Way before,” said Heidi, who is 28. “But in all honesty, I was not aware of all the initiatives,” it operates. She’s aware now.

United Way staff mingled with Young Leaders and their invited guests, to explain the organization and its purpose. Volunteer sign-up sheets and fundraising pledge sheets were circulated. Meanwhile, monogrammed lanyards and literature were available on nearby tabletops, for the crowd to take home.

Heidi said she was hooked, and she intends to remain hooked. “I think our generation is into making a difference,” she said. “This is obviously a good way to do it.”

Elise Shutzer discovered United Way when she worked for the same consulting firm in Boston. She served on the Young Leaders leadership team there. “So when I moved here (nine months ago), it was obvious for me to continue that connection,” she said.

Elise was heavily involved with children’s initiatives while she lived in Boston. In Washington, her interest has shifted to housing. But United Way can accommodate either or both.

“When I talk to people about United Way, they know the brand, but they don’t really know what United Ways do,” said Elise, who’s 29. “They all do so much good in so many ways. And they find ways every day to see if what they’re doing is working.”

Elise is not only active in United Way herself. She is a recruiter. And she recently landed a recruit she has known all his life—her younger brother, Aaron.

“He called me and said it was time to get involved in something,” Elise said. “And here he is.”

Aaron was busily chatting with a cluster of young people on the other side of the room. He looked like a United Way veteran, even though he had been at the Young Leaders event for only a few minutes.

“We really needed him,” said Elise. “He’s in finance. We need money!”
“I love this. I really do,” she said. “It’s something you feel good about.”

"WE CARE"

The warehouse holds 15,000 cubic feet and takes up most of a city block. It’s full of furniture for Native Americans, bedding for Africans, the occasional battered refrigerator door.

Right in the middle is a floor-to-ceiling shelf full of cardboard boxes. The outside of each box reads: BANDAGES. It might as well read: WE CARE.

Working with United Way of the National Capital Area, Christian Relief Services of Northern Virginia has spent the last two weeks collecting donations for beleaguered earthquake victims in Haiti.

UWNCA has spread the word to its agencies and supporters that medical supplies are urgently needed in Haiti. Christian Relief Services has agreed to collect donations and store them at its warehouse in Fredericksburg, Virginia.

At the end of February, CRS will load everything it has collected into an 18-wheeler owned by Interstate Van Lines. The truck will take the goods to a port in South Florida. From there, they will be shipped to a children’s hospital and orphanage in Haiti.

CRS normally supports Indian reservations in South Dakota and communities in the Third World. But the Haiti shelf is a source of special pride to Dave Frank, the superintendent of the CRS warehouse.

“The need is obvious,” he said one recent afternoon, as we toured the facility. “It’s nice to be part of the solution.”

Donors from all over the Washington area have contributed dozens of wheelchairs, crutches, bandages, medicine kits, personal hygiene kits, casting materials and medical implements, Frank said. All donors have been thanked, but Frank asked me to do so again.

“If people say thank you, it really makes a big difference,” he said.
By the end of the month, Frank said he expects to have collected between 30,000 and 40,000 pounds of medical supplies for Haitians. He saluted United Way for spearheading the drive.

“They’ve been very communicative, and no games,” he said. “They’re not worrying about who gets the God points.”

Frank asked donors not to contribute food or clothing, and he asked donors not to bring goods to his Fredericksburg warehouse.

Instead, donors should contact Monika Taylor of the United Way staff at mtaylor@uwnca.org or 202-488-2000. She will supply you with a collection box and a list of needed items. The drive ends Feb. 28.

Homelessness—It Lives In Your Neighborhood

A plain cinder-block building sits on an Alexandria street corner, across the street from a McDonald’s and beside an auto repair shop. The sign by the door says it’s Carpenter’s Shelter. But Executive Director Fran Becker has a punchier name for it.

She calls it the first chance and the last chance.
Carpenter’s Shelter is a 22-year-old center for Alexandria’s homeless. In 2009, Carpenter’s took in about 1,000 homeless people, the vast majority of them residents of Alexandria.

But Carpenter’s isn’t just somewhere to sleep. It’s a place where the homeless are coached, wheedled and helped not to be homeless any more.

Carpenter’s can house as many as 80 people on any one night. But it will not offer a bed for more than three nights to anyone who doesn’t agree to take financial literacy training, undergo health screening and look for a job.

“Our core values, they’ve never changed,” says Becker. “Our mission is to end and prevent homelessness.”

United Way funds have underwritten that effort from the beginning. Carpenter’s Shelter receives about 1.5 percent of its $1.6 million annual budget from United Way grants or workplace donors.

“We’re very conscious of any workplace giving we get,” says Becker, who has run Carpenter’s for the last 12 years. “We put it right to work in our programming.”

The population at Carpenter’s runs the gamut from men to women, from families to singles, from longtime Alexandrians to people who’ve just blown into town on the bus. On a recent Thursday afternoon, three men in work boots were eating lunch in the brightly lit Carpenter’s lunch room. But so were a mother and her infant daughter.

Residents can live at Carpenter’s indefinitely, as long as they “buy into what we demand,” says Becker.

“For the first time, we’re in their face,” she says. “We insist that they accept the idea that they’re responsible for their own life.” If they won’t look for a job or attend education classes, “we tell them, ‘Sorry, this isn’t the place for you.’ ”
Carpenter’s is rare among Washington-area homeless programs in the way it remains available to its alumni.

More than 400 former residents are enrolled in “after care.” That means that even after they’ve moved on and out, they can call Carpenter’s for a booster shot of confidence, counseling and (in some circumstances) cash.

“We continue to support the life skills that will mean they never come back here,” says Becker.
Like every community-based nonprofit, Carpenter’s could use much more United Way money. If it came, “we’d partner for more education or job training,” says Becker.

In the meantime, Carpenter’s logs more than $500,000 a year in volunteer labor and donations. The agency is about to finish a second consecutive year of deliberately spending beyond its budget. “The need is that great,” says Jasmin Witcher, director of development and strategic alliances.

“What we try to instill here is the responsibility,” says Becker. “It’s you. It’s no one else.”

And it’s a problem that ranges far beyond any one Alexandria neighborhood. The sign on the wall of the Carpenter’s executive offices makes the point quite crisply:
“Homelessness—It Lives In Your Neighborhood,” the sign says. Carpenter’s aims to change that—and keep it changed.