Trumbull United Way Meets Community Needs

By Ginny Pasha, President, United Way of Trumbull County

WARREN, Ohio — For more than 93 years, the United Way of Trumbull County has consistently worked to meet the health and human service needs of individuals and families in our county.  

In 2016, United Way of Trumbull County completed another successful campaign and is grateful to the many individuals, businesses and foundations that believe in the work of United Way and partner with us. For several years, Greenwood Chevrolet has been very generous in providing United Way of Trumbull County and United Way of Youngstown and the Mahoning Valley a vehicle or cash as a campaign incentive. We were excited to have another United Way of Trumbull County donor win their choice of a car or $15,000 in cash in 2016.

United Way of Trumbull County plays a critical role in our county by raising funds and creating long-term, effective solutions that support programs most needed. In 2016-2017, United Way of Trumbull County provided funding to 25 agencies for 43 programs that help seniors, adults and children receive access to a quality education, family sustaining income, preventative healthcare, critical resources and more. During that time, nearly 100,000 people accessed one or more funded services or programs

United Way of Trumbull County also takes a more targeted approach to meeting the needs of our community through our Reading Great by 8 Literacy Initiative and the Trumbull County Partnership for Financial Empowerment.

Since its introduction in 2014, and with support from many donors and foundations, the Reading Great by 8 Literacy Initiative has reached 165 students in the Ready, Set, Go summer program.

After two weeks of intensive reading intervention, more than 80% of the students showed gain in reading comprehension and literacy. Our Read 4 Fun program has reached nearly 6,000 students grades kindergarten through second.

The Partnership for Financial Empowerment, in conjunction with Cortland Bank and Junior Achievement of the Mahoning Valley, provided 15 women living in transitional housing with 10 hours of basic financial education. Age-appropriate books were provided to the children of the women to start laying the foundation for financial awareness. Women were rewarded with a savings account seeded with an initial deposited and opened in their name.

Additionally, 30 local agencies, financial institutions, educational and medical institutions took advantage of 20 hours of CPFB training that allowed them to be better able to understand how to work with low-income families to help those families achieve financial stability. During 2017, we intend to join a number of partners in increasing access to free income tax preparation throughout the county.

With the changing demographics of donors and the changing needs of our County, United Way of Trumbull County has developed creative partnerships outside of our annual campaign. As two examples: We are able to provide students with backpacks to start the school year and school supplies at the beginning of the second semester to finish the academic year successfully. We were able to provide families with hams and turkeys for Christmas.

In 2017, we will continue finding and nurturing partnerships that will benefit Trumbull County residents.

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