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Community support still needed for nonprofits

By Ben Rodgers
Editor


GREEN BAY – Nearly two months into the COVID-19 pandemic, nonprofit groups are still seeking support in Brown County and beyond.

With the Wednesday, May 13, Wisconsin Supreme Court ruling lifting Gov. Tony Evers’ Safer at Home order, groups that support the community’s most vulnerable are still at work to get people the help they need.

“The amount we have raised and the amount we distributed are significant amounts, but when you think about the fragile nature of the nonprofit community in general, it’s very fragile, and it will take everyone’s effort to make sure we stay safe and healthy as a community,” said Therese Woelfel, vice president of donor engagement for the Greater Green Bay Community Fund (GGBCF).

The GGBCF has received more than $1.5 million of support in donations for groups in Brown, Kewaunee and Oconto counties.

The Green Bay Packers also contributed $1 million for the Packers Give Back COVID-19 Community Relief Fund.

As of this week, the GGBCF awarded more than $1 million to nonprofit groups in the region from both funds.

“There is some immediate need right now, and no one can really predict how long this is going to go, or what impact it will have,” said Amber Paluch, GGBCF vice president of community engagement. “Up to this point, the dollars that have gone out have been for the most immediate, basic-needs-type service in the community.”

Paluch said awards include school districts, because of meal distribution, as well as homeless shelters, childcare, food pantries, housing assistance agencies, substance abuse programs and more.

With a new reality setting in for area nonprofits, she said most immediate issues have been or are being addressed, while some longer-term issues are now only unfolding.

“We know there are organizations that are really struggling from cancelled fundraisers, lack of revenue they would normally take in, diminished donations and these are all organizations that are critical to the health of a community overall,” Paluch said.

For example, a food pantry may have initially needed funds to purchase food with more people furloughed or laid off from work.

Now, that same pantry might be dealing with creating a new model of service, making sure the parking lot is uncongested, and keeping the lights on.

“We’re at a point now, a few weeks in, where some of that is stabilizing a little bit,” Paluch said. “Where some of those logistics have been in place and working, there’s less of that scramble to figure out how to continue to serve in such a unique time. There’s a lot of concern around simply paying the bills, paying rent for nonprofit facilities, the utilities, all of the operational expenses that continue on without the same type of dollars coming in. That’s where things I think are largely at right now.”

A united front

With the groups that support people needing help themselves, the pandemic has brought together GGBCF and Brown County United Way (BCUW), two organizations with similar goals.

“We all have different constituencies, different audiences that have an affinity, some toward Brown County United Way, some toward the Greater Green Bay Community Foundation,” said Tom Schoffelman, vice president of resource development and communication at BCUW. “We can set these funds up separately, but yet at the same time form a certain perspective, work very closely with one another. Our actual application forms I think we’re identical, so people could apply or organizations could apply for the Community Foundation or Brown County United Way.”

BCUW relies heavily on the support from area businesses, while GGBCF is focused on individuals.

Schoffelman said by the end of March, area businesses donated $155,000 to the BCUW emergency response fund.

Into April, he said the total reached $283,000 with private donations as small as $20 and as large as $10,000.

Since then, BCUW has awarded nearly $190,000 to 23 nonprofit organizations in Brown County.

“We’ve done six rounds of grants since this started, and it’s been the health and hygiene products, childcare, temporary housing, transportation, food, meals, those have been what organizations have been requesting of us, and that’s stayed fairly consistent so far,” Schoffelman said. “I think one of the emerging trends very well could be a mental health capacity and how this is affecting people.”

He said BCUW focuses on ALICE individuals, those who are asset limited, income restrained and employed.

“There are studies the United Way has done that show, in Brown County, traditional poverty is about 10-12 percent of the population, that hasn’t changed dramatically,” Schoffelman said. “But what has changed is that next group we’ve termed ALICE. They’re working, they’re working sometimes two jobs to make ends meet, but that’s basically what they’re doing, making ends meet. They’re not saving and when a crisis hits, and we’re seeing one right now, not just for ALICE, but for others, this is a manifestation of where many people are at on a regular basis – at least 24 percent of our households in Brown County.”

With no end to the effects of COVID-19 in sight, he said BCUW will continue to help nonprofit organizations reeling from the pandemic, but in the near future his group will need to switch mindsets to start fundraising for its annual campaign, which is entering the second of five years of annual fundraising.

“For a singular effort this is unique, but also, almost one in three Brown County households are living in this type of fear every day,” Schoffelman said. “We raise millions of dollars on an annual basis to help the population that faces this every day.”

Information on making donations or submitting applications can be found at browncountyunitedway.org and ggbcf.org.

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