United Way of St Johns County

Community investment: United Way of St. Johns County strategically invests in quality programs, building partnerships, advocating for better policies, engaging our community, and leveraging resources. One area of investment is through community impact grants provided to partner organizations in the community who focus on education, health, and financial stability. The process usually engages numerous community volunteers to visit and review programs. The pandemic required adjustments, but volunteers remained part of the review and approval process. Grants to 35 programs were approved during the year.

Arpa grants: United Way of St. Johns County administered arpa fund distribution for St. Johns County. The County received $7m federal arpa funds to assist with ongoing issues related to the covid pandemic. Uw-sjc was allotted over $5 million and tasked with creating, administering, and monitoring the process and progress of programs over the 18 month term. 22 programs were funded.

Emergency assistance: individual emergency assistance is provided to area residents facing financial instability due to an unexpected life event such as the inability to work due to medical emergency, caring for a family member, lack of transportation or other catastrophic issue. Assistance allows these working individuals to regain stability. Uw-sjc also provided a grant to the northeast Florida 2-1-1, an all-encompassing help line to connect those in need with services in the community.

Strategic investment grants: this new one-time grant was designed for requests that are collaborative and/or involve organizations that are not currently designated as United Way of St. Johns certified-partner agencies for community needs that fall within three designated areas: food insecurity, housing insecurity and mental health issues. The goal is to encourage organizations to work together, be creative and/or to be inclusive of newer partners that are doing amazing work on a smaller scale. Ten (10) grants were provided during the year.

Financial stability: realsense free tax preparation not only provides a free service to lower income households and a safe haven from predatory lending practices, it engages and trains volunteers on tax preparation, and most importantly, it returns much needed dollars to the households and in turn to the community. The program was expanded to include both St. Johns and putnam counties and more than doubled the number of returns completed to over 1200, keeping over $1 million in our community.

Other: the singlecare (previously familywize) prescription drug program provided savings on prescription drugs to people in the community. Assistance programs for residents in crisis provide information, services, and basic needs. Drives like tools for schools stock classrooms with student supplies. Team building activities through volunteer projects benefit not only the recipient but the volunteers as well as the sponsoring company. Donations received for specific programs are honored.

Holiday time assistance: supported by community donations since the 1980's, the empty stocking fund assists vulnerable children and seniors with funds for food, clothing, or toys for the holiday season. Management transitioned to United Way of St. Johns County in 2018. Uw-sjc continued collaborating with 7 other groups in the community to provide support to families and seniors. By partnering with local groups, those needing additional services were identified and matched with more comprehensive assistance. 858 families and seniors were served this year. In addition, uw-sjc coordinated the distribution of over 250 holiday meals in the community.