HAIR TO CUT HUNGER

A food drive for Valley United Way to assist the Spooner House of Shelton and St. Vincent dePaul of Derby is the brainchild of hair designers Diana Cirillo and Josie Campolattano. Diana is co-owner of Panache Hair Design, Shelton with her sister Jeni Mastrony and Josie is the owner of 67 West Hair Designers, Seymour. Both understand that the need for food in the Valley is great and want to do whatever they can to help. They have also enlisted some of their colleagues. Ron Sisbarro of Barber on Main-Ansonia; Maria Anderson of Maria’s Hair Gallery-Derby; Jennifer Kimen of New Day Hair & Skin Salon-Shelton and Lisa Raymond of Kut Rite-Seymour have all banded together with Diana and Josie to collect nonperishable’s through Thanksgiving and then once again for the Christmas holiday. Not only are these salons collecting food, “We are raising awareness on how important it is in these difficult economic times to help our friends and neighbors improve their quality of life,” states Diana Cirillo.

Diana, Josie and friends welcome other hair salons to join HAIR TO CUT HUNGER by calling Laurel Vicidomino at Valley United Way 203.926.9478 or by emailing laurel.vicidomino@valleyunitedway.org. All Valley residents are welcome to bring their non perishables to any of the participating salons at the addresses below:

Panache Hair Design, 504 Bridgeport Ave., Shelton

67 West Hair Designers, 39 New Haven Ave., Seymour

Barber on Main, 328 East Main Street, Ansonia

Maria’s Hair Gallery, 2 Division Street, Derby

New Day Hair & Skin Salon, 500 Howe Ave., Shelton

Kut Rite, 63 New Haven Road, Seymour

Finding new ways to help provide more food

Last night at the Gold Seal Awards Dinner, Jim Guarrera of Carey & Guarrera received one of the prestigious awards for his dedicated community service. Jim has been involved with many Valley organizations down through the years, but in recent years has been heavily involved with the St. Vincent DePaul Society which became United Way's newest partner agency earlier this year. Jim has seen a explosive growth in the need for food for clients that has been duplicated across the Valley with every agency that provides food for those in need.

Earlier this year, Jim came up with a great idea to prevent waste, do a bit of "recycling" and help alleviate hunger all at the same time. Because of St. Vincent DePaul's past involvement with our Corporate Volunteer Council's Harvest House projects, he knew that Valley United Way has a very strong interest in hunger in the Valley. In addition to Harvest House, we have also been working with the Postal Workers on the annual food drive that they do in the spring. He also knew that United Way has been a leader in the use of electronic technologies that might come into play on his project. Jim apprached Pat Tarasovic and myself with his idea to raise more funds not only for St. Vincent DePaul, but for all the agencies that have food pantries.

Jim's idea is fairly simple, but requires some work to implement. He noted that there are many people throughout the area who purchase tickets for sporting and cultural events and never use them. He asked, "Why don't we ask those people to donate unused tickets to be sold at their face value and the proceeds used to buy more food"? He even had a catchy name for the project - soupbowltickets.com. It sounded practical for us, so we sat down and started to work on the concept. A website will be developed where the story of the need can be told and the donated tickets can be sold.

The first step was to get a grip on the need and to examine just what is being accomplished and how. We convened a meeting of the providers, and they have helped compile data on what they are currently doing and the gap for unfilled needs.

At that point, a remarkable thing happened. Griffin Hospital approached United Way for help in implementing a very ambitious gift that they wanted to make in the form of a full trailer truck of new food for the community! We temporarily shifted gears from Jim's concept to coordinating Grffin's amazing gift. You can read the story of that remarkable gift by clicking here.

That was quickly followed by the Postal Wrokers drive and then our Corporate Volunteer Council's Harvest House project. (Full story & video - http://www.valleyunitedway.org/VAC/weekofcaring/2009/news.htm).
Those were all incredible success stories, but not enough to keep up with the increasing demand. St. Vincent DePaul has already run out of food!

Last night, Jim spurred us all back to action during his touching acceptance speech. He publicly announced our intent to make soupbowltickets.com a reality. On top of that, he announced that the Valley Board of Realtors is making a doantion of $1,000 to help get the project up and running. We're not there yet, but we'll let you know when we are ready.

In the meantime, if you are interested in the project, please contact us. Let us know what you think of the project and maybe even your willingness to get involved!

For more information about Valley United Way, visit our website at www.valleyunitedway.org.

Just how far can Nick Tarasovic go for Valley United Way?

Last week we were dealing with Farmers who had a unique Facebook challenge for Valley United Way, and this week we are moving on to athletes - well at least one athlete! I've known Nick Tarasovic ever since Pat Tarasovic came to work at United Way years ago. In Nick's case, I came to know of his love of sports and his high level of athletic ability. We even managed to get together for some basketball down through the years though the Senior Games. If you know Nick, he's pretty tall, and that always comes in handy when playing basketball. I'm not so sure that it is a great advantage when you are running, swimming or biking which is now Nick's big challenge - and ours.

Nick has been a runner forever, but in the last couple of years he has added the biking and swimming and completed his first mini-triathlon earlier this year after having run in several marathons down through the years. I don't think I need to say much about the dedication and determination that it takes for a marathon; but when you throw in biking and swimming events on top of it, it takes on a whole new life of its own. Evidently it works for Nick as he has taken off about forty pounds and is also taking seconds off all his times for the various events as well.

He has set a goal to run in the IronDistance Triathlon at Plymouth Rock next September and has already begun a training regimen. All he will have to do is swim 2.4 miles, ride a bike for 112 miles and run 26.2 more miles!! Now this is where you can participate by motivating Nick and helping United Way at the same time. We're following Nick's progress on our website and encouraging people to support his grueling schedule by pledging pennies per mile throughout his journey to the finish line next year. (You'd be surprised how pennies can add up when you train as much as Nick does!) It's simple to do by using the form on the page. During the course of the year, we'll be posting information and stories - and maybe some of your comments as we try to keep Nick motivated - not that he needs too much if you know Nick!

Nick gets plenty of motivation from his personal coach - granddaughter Grace Rose!

For more information about Valley United Way, visit our website at http://www.valleyunitedway.org/.

CAMPAIGN, CAMPAIGN, CAMPAIGN

BLUMSHAPIRO kicks off their campaign with an ice cream social.

Our campaign season continues….Throughout September and into October, presentations were made at Ansonia schools, Webster Bank, BIC, Yankee Gas, California Closets, RD Scinto, Fletcher Thompson, HealthNet, BlumShapiro, Bank of America and ATT! And there are still many more to come. What better way to spread the word about the many great things Valley United Way does?

You may ask…

WHAT IS A CAMPAIGN PRESENTATION?
It is a 10 minute session, informing people of:
• What Valley United Way does for the community and their 24 Health and Human Service agencies
• How United Way agencies can assist you and your coworker’s families and friends
• Many volunteer opportunities available

CAN YOU HELP US BY HOSTING A CAMPAIGN PRESENTATION AT YOUR PLACE OF EMPLOYMENT?
We would love to talk to you about it, please email laurel.vicidomino@valleyunitedway.org for further information.

WE NEED YOUR HELP!

Jones Family Farms in the lead!!

It's only been a week since the "Farmers Facebook Challenge" was announced and Jones Family Farms and Bishops Orchard began the dash to 5,000 new fans by Thanksgiving with the real winners being Valley United Way, the Working Lands Allianceand the Guilford Community Fund as the farms will be donating up to a total of $5,000 to the three groups based on the results of the campaign.

How are we doing?

During the past week, we've been posting, blogging, Twittering, Facebooking and e-mailing to get out the word of the challenge, and it seems to be working. Using the statistics provided by our good friends at the Valley Independent Sentinel, we've calculated that 3,288 new fans have been added to the two farms friends lists. We're excited that Jones Family farms is in the lead with 2,351 to Bishops 937 new fans!!

Check out the comments on the Fans page

One of the great things that comes out of this is not only the new fans added, but the wonderful comments being made on the pages. Just take a look at pictures and comments on the Jones Page, and you will get a feel for just how important farms still are in all our lives.

So, thanks to the farms and for all the new fans out there. Through our combined use of social networking,we really are a connected group!

Tri-Challenge Coming This Week

We're also working with a familiar face on another challenge that we hope to have on the United Way website this week. Just a hint - this one involves sports.

For more information about Valley United Way, visit our website at www.valleyunitedway.org.

"EXTREME HOME MAKE OVER” Valley Style!

A legally blind Mother of three witnessed a miracle at the hands of so many Valley residents. After a home improvement went drastically wrong, she was left with a house that literally had a hole in the roof allowing all the winter snow and freezing rain to enter her home which cause mold to overtake her entire home.
Compassionate Community Services, Inc. had been helping Laura meet her everyday needs by providing food for the family etc. Kim Chernecky, Executive Director of CCS had nominated Laura’s house for the ABC Extreme Home Makeover show but she was not selected.
I remember like it was yesterday, Doris Burdo, a SHELTON resident called Valley United Way’s Volunteer Center to say that she was interested in Volunteering. After a nice conversation with Doris, she said that her husband was a contractor and he was very interested in doing a little volunteering as well.
Being aware as I was about Laura’s need for a new roof, I asked if he would be willing to go and take a look at her house. Frank Burdo, I’ll call him “Saint Frank”, said sure he would go and take a look at it. Frank immediately saw the enormous urgent need and set up another time for he and his brother to go back over to the house and build something that would al least stop the rain, snow and elements from entering her house. It worked! I remember Frank saying to me that her house was in catastrophic condition and that she needed a new roof. It was also very apparent that the mold was out of control and the smell had penetrated her entire home to the point that it was unhealthy for Laura and her three children to remain living there.
Just at the same time a few neighbors stopped bye to see if they could help and Laura told them to call me because as Valley United Way’s Volunteer Director my role was to assist non profit agencies if they had a need for Volunteers … I met Kim Chernecky and the need for Volunteers to help was quite clear from the start.
We rapidly spiraled into a speed that was like none that I had ever seen before! The next thing that happened was a meeting at VUW for everyone who was interested in volunteering. The CORE group of Laura’s Volunteers emerged…we had begun the task that would take nearly 10 months to complete from beginning to end… (More to come on Monday with more pictures…. )

NEVER DOUBT THAT A SMALL GROUP OF THOUGHTFUL COMMITTED CITIZENS CAN CHANGE THE WORLD; INDEED, IT IS THE ONLY THINK THAT EVER HAS.

For more information about Valley United Way, visit our website at www.valleyunitedway.org.

From Rachel's Challenge to Farmers' Challenge

We recently blogged about a very special and serious challenge centered on preventing violence in schools called Rachel's Challenge. Today, we have another "Challenge", but this one is much lighter in tone. Our good friends over at the Jones Family Farms are involved in a challenge with some other good farmers - the people at Bishop's Orchards in Guilford. Their challenge involves growing, but this time its not plants and vegetables - it's donors and Facebook users!

For every fan that joins their respective Facebook pages between 8:00am Thursday October 22nd and 8:00am on Friday November 27th (day after Thanksgiving) the two farms have dedicated themselves to donate $1 each (up to a maximum of 5000 fans total between the two farms) to charities of their choosing. The friendly battle doesn’t end there however. The second place owner will travel to the winning farm and put in a good honest days work during the Christmas season.

Valley United Way is fortunate enough to be the recipient of Jones Family Farms generosity while the Guilford Community Fund will benefit from the Bishops Farm donation. The Working Land's Alliance will benefit from donations from both farms.

Here in the Valley, The Jones Family Farms are part of the social and economic fabric of the community. It's pumpkin time at the farm right now, and this weekend they have their special UNICEF Children's Festival going on. Children are encouraged to show up in costume and participate in a variety of special activities at Pumpkinseed Hill. My personal favorite time to visit is Christmas for the annual purchase of a real Christmas tree. I know that artificial trees are gaining in popularity, but there's nothing like your own fresh cut tree from the Jones Family farm. At other times of the year, its strawberries and blueberries that draw attention. And of course we don't want to forget the new winery (Not really so new, but in comparison to the farm's long history, it's still new!) and the food and cooking classes. The farm has truly become a year round destination!

Getting back to the challenge - We're also big believers in using technology and social media to keep people informed of what goes on at United Way and to invite their feedback. We have been a pioneer among United Ways dating back to being the first United Way in the state of Connecticut to have a website. We use Twitter, YouTube, Facebook and this blog in addition to the website, so when our farmer friends called, we were ready to respond.

The greatest thing about this challenge is that it is a win-win situation for everyone involved. Hopefully thousands of people will learn more about two great farms and three great nonprofit organizations. Not only will there be learning opportunities, but some real and "virtual" friendships will be made that hopeful will last a lifetime. And lest I forget, the donations will be very helpful during a period when the economy is stressing the resources of our nonprofits to the limit.

So let me close by thanking our friends at Jones Family Farms and Bishops Orchards for this innovative challenge, and we want you to go to the Jones Family Farms Facebook site right now and sign up to be a Fan - you'll be happy that you did!

And watch for another unique new challenge coming up next week at Valley United Way!!

IT'S CAMPAIGN SEASON!!!

EVEN AT VALLEY UNITED WAY!

In late August and early September, Jack Walsh and myself made numerous United Way presentations, some of which included the Shelton, Seymour and Derby School systems as well as Griffin Hospital and Basement Systems of Seymour.

We have already received very successful campaign results from the Shelton school system who is up 85% from last year, the Seymour school system who is up 22%, Griffin Hospital who is up 20% as well as Basement Systems whose employees took a 'surprise $100 bonus each' from their CEO, Larry Janesky and combined it with additional personnel funds to increase their campaign almost 900%!!! WOW!!

These fantastic results could not be possible without the help of school Superintendants, CEO's and Campaign Coordinators at each location. We would like to thank the following people for their time, effort and dedication to Valley United Way in helping to make our community an even better place to live.

Shelton School System: Freeman Burr, Kathy Riddle, Sandie Zuraw.
Seymour School System: MaryAnne Mascolo, Christine Syriac, April Judd, Karen Wilczewski, Judy Laudati, Roxanne Lindgren, Lucille McGinn, Pat Sabatini, Alison Cunningham, Darlene O'Callaghan and Sue Duke.
Griffin Hospital: Patrick Charmel and Steve Mordecai
Basement Systems: Larry Janesky and Julie Morelli

A heartfelt thank you to all of you! More campaign info and results to come.....

Rachel's Challenge a success at Derby High School

In addition to the regular allocations process, Valley United way generally offers a special round of funding for special needs grants that match the intent of donors who have designated certain areas of special interest. Though the grants tend to be much smaller then regular allocations, they can still make a major difference in a community. A good example is the grant made to the Derby Youth Services Bureau earlier this year.

Director John Saccu requested funding for help "keeping kids safe and on track". We would like to assume that schools are inherently safe places, but this week's tragedy at UCONN brings home the reality that there can be problems.

John wanted to create a series of real life situations through interactive theatre and improvisational role-laying by teens. Last Friday, the program came to life at Derby High School in the form of Rachels' Challenge. Rather than giving our own report, you can read about the program through students in the Journalism Class who wrote their story for the Valley Indepependent sentinel. Click here to read their account of "emotionally-charged silence".

New edition of the VUW e-newsletter posted today

'Click here to read the latest edition of Valley United Way's e-newsletter.'

Bill Nimons is now Platinum!

In an earlier blog, I congratulated Dave Grant and Pat Tarasovic for the community awards that they were receiving, and as if to prove that things happen in threes - I have another Valley United Way volunteer to congratulate. Board Member Bill Nimons has just been announced as this year's winner of the Greater Valley Chamber of Commerce's highest award for community service - The Platinum Award.

The award criteria speaks for itself. It is for someone who has been recognized with the Chamber's Gold Seal Award at least 10 years ago, and still remains active in the Community. Bill received his Gold Seal Award in 1990, but you would think it was just yesterday with his incredible and ongoing record of involvement. Bill was Chair of the Annual Community Fund Raising campaign back in 1986 and served as President of the Board in 1991. He is back on the Board now and is the Treasurer. You can read more about him by visiting the story about his 2006 Charles H. Flynn Humanitarian Award.

Bill will receive his award along with the Gold and Silver Award recipients at the Gold Seal Awards dinner in November. You can make reservations by visiting the Greater Valley Chamber of Commerce website.

Third grade reading and prison!

This morning, the Valley Council for Health & Human Services' Early Childhood Task Force held an interesting breakfast with Elaine Zimmerman, Executive Director of the Connecticut Commission on Children as the speaker. She was there to discuss child poverty in Connecticut and the fact that 35,000 Connecticut children will fall into poverty during the current recession. She presented an overwhelming body of evidence including statistics showing the terrible costs of this problem.

One bit of information that jumped out at me was an assertion that third grade reading scores are being used to forecast future needs for prison capacity! On the surface that may seem surprising; but when you think of the long term impact that a lack of reading skills can have on someone's life, it is not as surprising as it may seem. She further made the link to pre-school education programs and the beneficial effects of ensuring that all children arrive at kindergarten with the basic skills needed to succeed.

She pointedly remarked that the Valley's efforts in this area are outstanding and that the level of cooperation that she has seen throughout the area is remarkable. What she didn't realize was that she indirectly played a role in helping to facilitate that collaboration years ago.

Just about fifteen years ago, she spoke in that same room at a Valley United Way government breakfast - and she spoke about early childhood and children back then as well. The group in the room included not only government leaders, but also the nonprofit health and human services agencies. The year before, a similar breakfast focused on substance abuse and resulted in the formation of the Valley Substance Abuse Action Council. This time Elaine's message was overshadowed by a proposed state plan to regionalize the delivery of services that would have had a devastating effect on the delivery of service to Valley constituents.

The group in attendance banded together and got the state to change the proposal to keep the Valley together and ensure that the Valley delivery system would remain intact. What also happened is that group realized the potential for working together and decided to form the Valley Council for Health & Human Services which has continued to meet monthly ever since to foster cooperation and collaboration among Valley nonprofits.

It was only fitting to have Elaine back today in light of the fact that the very first committee formed by the Valley Council was a youth committee which has evolved into the current Early Childhood Task Force!

Let me close with one very positive statistic that Elaine gave which shows why the work of the Task Force is so important. She noted that the return on every dollar invested in early childhood is 16 dollars. That's an amazing statistic, and one that we in the Valley should be very proud of.

Thank you for a great start

I want to take a moment this morning to thank everyone involved with last night's Community Fund Raising Campaign Kickoff held at the Center for Cancer Care at Griffin Hospital. Patrick Charmel and everyone at Griffin Hospital could not have been more accommodating in sponsoring the event. Their own leadership in supporting the community and United Way is extraordinary and we are all very fortunate to have such a great community hospital serving our needs. The full story with lots of pictures can be found on our website.

The attendance was great even though it was an unseasonably chilly night for the end of September. That was more than made up by the warmth and friendship of everyone in attendance. The food was great as always, but the friendships were even better. We couldn't have a better Campaign Chair then Fred Ortoli. Fred is the perfect example of a community leader as you could tell from not only his own background, but also his remarks during the program.

Mike Marcinek, who has chaired four of these campaigns, did a great job as master of ceremonies in keeping the program moving and informative. The audience was responsive throughout the evening, and I hope that everyone enjoyed themselves and that we are all now prepared for the work ahead in making this year's campaign as successful as possible.

Watch for regular updates throughout the campaign.

Community Campaign Begins Tonight!

After an incredible weekend with the Harvest House, it's time to turn our attention to the Annual Community Fund Raising Campaign, which is the heart and soul of the United Way mission. Activities such as Harvest House and Back to School Clothes for Kids are incredible examples of the community coming together to meet identified needs, but we can't lose sight of the financial need involved in providing those services.

Tonight marks the formal start to this year's Community Fund Raising Campaign, and we have the ideal setting to begin the venture. Griffin Hospital is celebrating their 100th year of service to the Valley this year, and they are hosting the Kickoff at the new Center for Cancer Care in Derby. The program starts at 5:30 PM and the community is invited, but reservations for this free event are needed. Just visit our website and fill out the form!

What an incredible weekend! In case you missed the earlier stories, our Corporate Volunteer Council invited the community to help them build a house made of non-perishable food items, Harvest House III, this past weekend, and the response was fantastic. Rather than a long blog, the best way to see this incredible project is to look at the pictures and videos on our website.

Today, the most important part of the project will take place when the house is taken apart and the food is distributed to food banks throughout the Valley area to help alleviate the growing shortage of food in the Valley area. We'll have more pictures and a full story later today.

And just another quick reminder that the Annual Community Campaign Kickoff is Wednesday at Griffin's Center for Cancer care in Derby. You can make your reservation on our website.