United Way of West Florida

United Way of West Florida, Inc. Manages a community investment process to distribute donor contributions to non-profits serving escambia and santa rosa counties that are affecting positive community changes in the areas of health, education, and financial stability. Our goals are to reduce obesity and unhealthy behaviors while increasing stable and healthy independent living, increasing reading proficiency and decreasing poverty while stabilizing families with an increase in banking, employability, and sustainable financial success. We awarded 480,000 to partner agency programs through this process. In addition, we participated stuff the bus which distributed funds to escambia and santa rosa school county districts for the purpose of school supplies. We also partnered with local television and radio stations for miracles on palafox, which distributed gift cards to low-income families.

2022 -2023 was a time of growth and expansion for the program provided by 211nwfl. We continually offer our free service to anyone in need who calls our easy to remember 211 number 24 hours a day, 7 days a week - including all holidays. Our service area expanded from 8 to 10 counties with the addition of 988 the suicide and crisit lifeline. The expanded service area required an increase staff capacity to serve all 10 counties plus 988 calls. Staff included day to day phone coverage, resource vetting and trainers. The 211nwfl contracted service area for the Florida veterans support line counties serves 10 counties and expanded services by offering a monthly coffee with a vet program and employees degreed full time veteran care coordinators and 1 full time veteran recourse specialist. The 211nwfl public website is a resource data base that contains information on over 1,700 human services for veterans, mental health, food assistance, daycare, support groups, and more. Local nonprofits, school staff and case management specialists also have access to the database to help their clients that may not have immediate access to a telephone or the internet. 211nwfl, including 988 and the Florida veteran support line, provided 100,575 referrals which impacted 59,555 individuals and 2,872 veterans.

Donors to the United Way of West Florida's fall 2022 campaign designated 480,000 of their contributions to specific agency programs. To the extent possible, United Way works to ensure that all designations stay local in our service area, escambia and santa rosa counties. The revenues generated from designation distributions represent the fees United Way assesses to recipient agencies to offset the costs of fundraising and management related to these designations.

United Way is involved with a number of other initiatives designed to support its missions, including the following: ambassador program - ambassadors are volunteers who are "loaned" to United Way by their employers to serve as the primary advocates for uwwf through the workplace campaigns. The ambassador program is designed to help participants develop their leadership skills and understanding of the non- profit community through regular training seminars that feature community leaders and non-profit leaders. Nine (9) ambassadors volunteered 99 hours during the 2022-2023 campaign season. Day of caring - day of caring is the largest single volunteer service in escambia and santa rosa counties. Local volunteers are matched with non-profit agencies and schools to spend a full day or half day working on a variety of service projects. In total, 558 volunteers contributed 2,384 hours of volunteer labor, valued at an estimate 47,489.28 of community impact. Singlecare, formerly called familywize is a longtime partner with the United Way system. Working with nearly 1,000 United ways dedicated to helping improve health and well-being of individuals, families, and communities. United Way helped 7,462 citizens save over 816,672.90 on prescription medicine during this fiscal year. Vita - vita is the volunteer income tax assistance program, managed by United Way serves escambia and santa rosa counties. The program uses training irs certified volunteers to provide free tax preparation for low income individuals and families. In the last year, the vita program prepared over 735 returns. The program saved users almost 161,700 in tax preparation fees. Rsvp - rsvp is a federally funded retirement senior volunteer program offered by United Way. Individuals 55 and older are matched with local volunteer sites recruited by United Way. Rsvp offered 11 lunch and learn events plus one holiday party. The program recruited and maintained 39 unduplicated rsvp members who recorded 1,211.75 service hours.