Program areas at NeighborImpact
Neighborimpact runs an extensive early care and education program; this includes head start, early head start, and child care resources. Head start and early head start which serve children at 27 classroom locations and four early head start socialization centers throughout deschutes and crook counties. The head start and early head start programs works with families and children in an effort to break the cycle of intergenerational poverty. This program also provides children with medical, vision, and dental screenings and assessments while they work toward kindergarten readiness. Neighborimpact's nationally recognized child care resources program provides training, technical assistance, business support, and childcare subsidies to childcare providers to grow the availability of high quality childcare in the region. The child care resources division was the recipient of an $8 million grant from the Oregon legislature to be used to create more childcare slots in the region and to train workers for the childcare industry.
Neighborimpact's energy program helps to coordinate utility bill payments to prevent power shut offs in central Oregon households and to help low-income residents to pay utility bills. This program assists with electricity, natural gas, propane, oil, wood and pellets, and in some circumstances, water.
The housing program at Neighborimpact serves individuals in need of rent assistance, emergency housing assistance, and emergency shelter throughout central Oregon. Neighborimpact's housing stabilization program played a key role in distributing funds from the Oregon governor's emergency order 24-02 directing use of state resources to maintain the added capacity to the state's shelter system, rehouse people experiencing homelessness, and prevent homelessness. The organization also assisted in distribution of eviction prevention funding and managed the data system used by all regional providers. In addition, Neighborimpact operated the stepping stone homeless shelter in bend.
Neighborimpact's other services include: weatherization (expense: $1,925,671) helping make energy efficiency upgrades to housing for low and moderate income households; home ownership and financial capability counseling (expense: $1,296,792); lending (expense: $244,309) which made loans to provide down payment assistance and to rehabilitate homes for low and moderate income homeowners; and the rep payee program (expense: $190,071) which pays bills on behalf of individuals who, due to cognitive or physical limitations, are unable to manage their financial affairs; and community development, (expense: $51,790), which administers the community development block grant program. Since the pandemic of 2020, Neighborimpact has experienced significant growth in the number of individuals served by the regional food bank. The organization is feeding approximately 62,000 individuals monthly, compared to 14,000-16,000 fed monthly in 2019. Neighborimpact works in partnership with 58 local organizations to distribute food throughout the region. Neighborimpact also conducts direct distribution using its mobile pantry and through its fresh to you produce distributions. In addition to distributing food, Neighborimpact provides education to consumers on how to cook fresh and commodity products and how to stretch a household food budget. In 2023, Neighborimpact completed fundraising $5 million to construct a new expanded warehouse in redmond, Oregon, to meet its expanding needs. Other programs provided additional support to the community and are grouped for reporting purposes.