United Ways unite - Westfair Communications

A July 1 merger has created a single United Way agency of three.

The United Way of Stamford, the United Way of Northern Fairfield County and the Housatonic-Shepaug United Way now operate under the banner United Way of Western Connecticut.

The new entity is headquartered in Danbury and overseen with a board of four members from Stamford, four from Northern Fairfield and one from Housatonic-Shepaug.

“The main focus of the merger was to look at the environment the nonprofits are operating under, put together the best model to address regional issues, and develop regional strategies that are executed locally,” said June Renzulli, CEO of the merged entities. She had headed the Danbury region”™s United Way of Northern Fairfield County before the merger.

“The long-range plan is for more people in the community to hear the same message in the same language as we begin speaking about the same issues around the same strategies,” Renzulli said. She gave as an example addressing on a regional basis the lack of affordable housing in the lower county and, increasingly, in the Danbury region as well. “The nonprofit Housing Development Fund in Greater Stamford is now working in the Greater Danbury area using the same strategies they used in the Stamford area, replicating the same strategies up here,” she said.

Before the merger, each of the three United Ways had its own board of directors looking at local issues and making decisions locally. The boards, she said, were “siloed,” dealing locally with issues of a regional nature. The merger lets the three boards “think on a regional level and bring local efforts to execute them.”

Back office work

That the smaller Danbury United Way and not the larger Stamford organization should be the headquarters of the merged chapters may seem strange, but “where you do your back office doesn”™t matter,” Renzulli said. “Where you mobilize your community does matter; where you improve lives matters. The basic corporate back office is located in Danbury, but the Stamford community will see the same dollars flowing into it and have more presence because the staff can use more of its time to mobilize around the core issues.”

The Danbury operations have had a partnership with the United Ways of Norwalk-Wilton and with the New Canaan United Way for several years. “We have the talent on our staff for the financial service piece that allows them to do their mission-critical work without having to create another back office,” Renzulli said. “We”™ve been working with Norwalk-Wilton for more than seven years and have been partnering with New Canaan for three or four years.”

Before the merger, the United Way of Northern Fairfield County “had a very strategic board and a group of volunteers and a dedicated staff that were always looking for something creative and strategic to do,” she said. “The other boards are also strategic and are exploring different ways of doing business and how a nonprofit will look in the future.”

The national United way of America, she said, “has challenged United Ways over the last three years about how we can do our business more effectively and create more lasting change in our communities,” she said. “The issues we address don”™t have a geographic boundary. A lot of people work in Stamford and live in Danbury, live in New Milford and work in Danbury and even Stamford. They all have the same issues affecting their lives.”

Local outcomes

Renzulli said the merged United Ways examined their core business of “improving community conditions, improving the lives in our communities and fundraising as a strategic strength in mobilizing communities and strategies, and then asked how we could accomplish the work.” That work, she said, is accomplished “basically through a community plan in three areas ”“ successful kids and strong families; increasing self-sufficiency; and promoting community health. Under those areas, each community comes up with the outcomes they”™d like to achieve, and then applies programs to help them achieve those outcomes.”

Nonprofits, she said, are facing some daunting leadership challenges the merger could help address. During the next five years almost 45 percent of nonprofit leadership will be retiring, she said, citing national projections. “All nonprofits should be looking at how to strategically restructure and build the capacity of their organization and achieve their mission in the future.”

United Way, she said, is asking where nonprofits want to be in five years, and how can the United Way help. “We need a local relationship to help us do the work in our community, and it”™s very much based on keeping a local presence.”

A total of 15 towns will benefit from the merger, according to United Way: Bethel, Bridgewater, Brookfield, Danbury, Kent, New Fairfield, Newtown, New Milford, Redding, Ridgefield, Roxbury, Sherman, Stamford, Warren and Washington.