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United Way, Community Action, other agencies join forces
By W. T. Eckert
Hudson-Catskill Newspapers
CATSKILL — Sometimes it really does take a village.
Formed in November by United Way of Columbia and Greene Counties Executive Director Brad Poster, the Unmet Needs Committee of Columbia and Greene Counties aims to match needs with a variety of local solutions from local agencies.
The committee was born out of Hurricane Irene and Poster said the long-term goal is to maintain the committee so that when future events occur they can respond quickly.
“The committee members range from crisis and case management workers to FEMA, Red Cross … as well as several local service agencies,” Poster said. “Governor Cuomo tagged the United Way of New York State to distribute the money the state had to distribute to Irene victims.”
The UWNYS developed guidelines and procedures to allocate the funds, since it is a grant application and allocation procedure, through local United Ways of each county.
“The Unmet Needs Committee also helps evaluate the applications for the UWNYS Hurricane Irene Recovery Fund,” Poster said. “The UWCG applied for $60,000 on behalf of 13 individual applications. The review team has accepted the application and is releasing the first check now.”
On Tuesday Poster announced the committee received its first check for $36,600 for HIRF from the UWNYS. The actual funds will be issued to the applicants by the paying suppliers, the medical bills, and the rental or mortgage assistance for which the applications were submitted.
UWCG turned the funds over to Florence Ohle, executive director of Community Action of Greene County, to distribute the money.
“We work with Brad and the United Way on a regular basis,” Ohle said, “and we have been trying to coordinate efforts, find out who is collecting money, what needs were going to be addressed and what are the conditions for the funding. Trying to all work together so that there are no duplications.”
The committee just kind of evolved, Ohle said. Since Poster isn’t able to provide direct service and he needed and agency that could be the fiscal conduit and produce the checks to help the applicants, that is where Ohle said CAGC got involved, only to meet and distribute the money that the United Way has.
Community Action staffers have been doing outreach before the committee began, Ohle added, but now solutions have become more available.
“We let people know that we have funds available,” Ohle said, “and we address the needs we can and we refer to other outside agencies and then we had the applications from the United Way, we knew that was another resource.”
Ohle said the agency can only provide so much help, but the United Way funds are a help.
“People lost everything,” Ohle said, “Even if you get the maximum, like some of the families [that applied], $30,000 doesn't go very far if you lost everything. From there we just present the United Way applications to the Unmet Needs Committee.”
The applications come through CAGC case managers, Project Hope, DSS and other sources. Once they are turned in, Poster and Ohle get together, review them and submit them to the Unmet Needs Committee.
Other funds are available through CAGC and Ohle said they try to keep on top of what other services are available in the community.
“We are reaching out to everybody,” Ohle said, “because housing is a huge need for these people that were displaced. So if they have grant money available that can take off some of the financial burden then those are the people that need to be at the table.”
Resources like Weatherization, Catskill Mountain Housing or The Hunter Foundation, are just a few that have been at the table with the Unmet Needs Committee, working together to maximize the resources for those affected by Irene.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has representatives at the table in the form of Volunteer Agency Liaisons.
“What we do is we provide a go-between between FEMA and the voluntary entities,” FEMA VAL Malcolm Hardy said, “and the response mode is to collect shelter numbers, to provide information to Red Cross, Salvation Army, and any of the large scale volunteer groups, helping connect them to the people on the ground who need help.”
Hardy said VALs help look for where the needs are in the community, who needs help and why and what they need specifically.
“Because federal assistance only covers a certain amount,” Hardy said, “nonprofit and local coalitions become the ending answer.”
By making the committee more resilient through sharing all the information available to them, as well as being more public, transparent and accepting of resources and ideas and solutions, Hardy said the better the community in general can become from them.
“We in FEMA have a catchword now called ‘whole communities,’” Hardy said. “It’s the idea of being a part of the team. A multifaceted group that engages FEMA including, on a state level, state government and state partners, local government and local partners as well as all the partners on the sidelines.”
Anyone, Hardy said, including local volunteers, all of them contributing their time and spending that time doing the things necessary to help out.
“All those mechanisms come together to produce a good result,” Hardy said.
Anyone in need or that knows someone in need from damages that occurred during Irene can contact Community Action of Greene County, Inc. at 518-943-9205 or email fohle@cagcny.org and Brand Poster at UWCG by calling 518-755-2155 or email bposter@uwgc.org.
To reach reporter W. T. Eckert, call 518-943-2100, ext. 3325, or e-mail wteckert@thedailymail.net
Formed in November by United Way of Columbia and Greene Counties Executive Director Brad Poster, the Unmet Needs Committee of Columbia and Greene Counties aims to match needs with a variety of local solutions from local agencies.
The committee was born out of Hurricane Irene and Poster said the long-term goal is to maintain the committee so that when future events occur they can respond quickly.
“The committee members range from crisis and case management workers to FEMA, Red Cross … as well as several local service agencies,” Poster said. “Governor Cuomo tagged the United Way of New York State to distribute the money the state had to distribute to Irene victims.”
The UWNYS developed guidelines and procedures to allocate the funds, since it is a grant application and allocation procedure, through local United Ways of each county.
“The Unmet Needs Committee also helps evaluate the applications for the UWNYS Hurricane Irene Recovery Fund,” Poster said. “The UWCG applied for $60,000 on behalf of 13 individual applications. The review team has accepted the application and is releasing the first check now.”
On Tuesday Poster announced the committee received its first check for $36,600 for HIRF from the UWNYS. The actual funds will be issued to the applicants by the paying suppliers, the medical bills, and the rental or mortgage assistance for which the applications were submitted.
UWCG turned the funds over to Florence Ohle, executive director of Community Action of Greene County, to distribute the money.
“We work with Brad and the United Way on a regular basis,” Ohle said, “and we have been trying to coordinate efforts, find out who is collecting money, what needs were going to be addressed and what are the conditions for the funding. Trying to all work together so that there are no duplications.”
The committee just kind of evolved, Ohle said. Since Poster isn’t able to provide direct service and he needed and agency that could be the fiscal conduit and produce the checks to help the applicants, that is where Ohle said CAGC got involved, only to meet and distribute the money that the United Way has.
Community Action staffers have been doing outreach before the committee began, Ohle added, but now solutions have become more available.
“We let people know that we have funds available,” Ohle said, “and we address the needs we can and we refer to other outside agencies and then we had the applications from the United Way, we knew that was another resource.”
Ohle said the agency can only provide so much help, but the United Way funds are a help.
“People lost everything,” Ohle said, “Even if you get the maximum, like some of the families [that applied], $30,000 doesn't go very far if you lost everything. From there we just present the United Way applications to the Unmet Needs Committee.”
The applications come through CAGC case managers, Project Hope, DSS and other sources. Once they are turned in, Poster and Ohle get together, review them and submit them to the Unmet Needs Committee.
Other funds are available through CAGC and Ohle said they try to keep on top of what other services are available in the community.
“We are reaching out to everybody,” Ohle said, “because housing is a huge need for these people that were displaced. So if they have grant money available that can take off some of the financial burden then those are the people that need to be at the table.”
Resources like Weatherization, Catskill Mountain Housing or The Hunter Foundation, are just a few that have been at the table with the Unmet Needs Committee, working together to maximize the resources for those affected by Irene.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has representatives at the table in the form of Volunteer Agency Liaisons.
“What we do is we provide a go-between between FEMA and the voluntary entities,” FEMA VAL Malcolm Hardy said, “and the response mode is to collect shelter numbers, to provide information to Red Cross, Salvation Army, and any of the large scale volunteer groups, helping connect them to the people on the ground who need help.”
Hardy said VALs help look for where the needs are in the community, who needs help and why and what they need specifically.
“Because federal assistance only covers a certain amount,” Hardy said, “nonprofit and local coalitions become the ending answer.”
By making the committee more resilient through sharing all the information available to them, as well as being more public, transparent and accepting of resources and ideas and solutions, Hardy said the better the community in general can become from them.
“We in FEMA have a catchword now called ‘whole communities,’” Hardy said. “It’s the idea of being a part of the team. A multifaceted group that engages FEMA including, on a state level, state government and state partners, local government and local partners as well as all the partners on the sidelines.”
Anyone, Hardy said, including local volunteers, all of them contributing their time and spending that time doing the things necessary to help out.
“All those mechanisms come together to produce a good result,” Hardy said.
Anyone in need or that knows someone in need from damages that occurred during Irene can contact Community Action of Greene County, Inc. at 518-943-9205 or email fohle@cagcny.org and Brand Poster at UWCG by calling 518-755-2155 or email bposter@uwgc.org.
To reach reporter W. T. Eckert, call 518-943-2100, ext. 3325, or e-mail wteckert@thedailymail.net
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