Fairbanks Homeless & Housing Coalition: 10/18 reg. meeting plus
Two 4 hour planning sessions for the Ten Year Strategic Plan to End Homelessness,
Youth Focus (a subcommittee of the FHHC) – I chair this & we are planning a PIT (point in time) count January 26, Saturday.
Public Service Announcement: 30 second PSA was recorded & distributed for radio & TV – this continues to be played. Every week we hear from someone that they heard it. After the elections, Nov. 6, I will call around and encourage that it continue to play. We have heard a positive response from the community.
K-LOVE 88.3 new PSA. They have revised it slightly and will begin airing it 10/29/2012. I have an interview scheduled 11/13 as well.
Channel 13 – impromptu – but squeezed it in on 10.25.
Quarterly letter via Mail Chimp on Sept. 24. This was our first use of mail chimp to ~ 193 people. There were 18 bounces but only 36% of the people opened the document. It may have been that we ended up in people’s spam folder. Sarah, Patrick and I will work on this.
Website Overhaul: In the next month it is our hope that you will see a slightly different face to the webpage. We need a different template that we can work with in order to provide the most current and pertinent information on the front page. Stay tuned.
10/16 Friends Church, Pastor Jeff Wall for 1 ½ hrs. He shared his story and interest in youth -and of course I shared our journey.
10/23 Mike Powers, CEO at FMH. *Mike offered this for a start: since FMH is about a healthy community, they would like to support us as we continue our board trainings. Next year, he offered that FMH would support board development time with Foraker, or whomever we wanted training from.
10/24 Quota Fairbanks chapter 2 – noon luncheon (They are eager to help us via food/snack drive, etc.)
10/28 Appetite for Missions: Dave Bates, Meryem, had a table and participated in the Sunday event at Door Of Hope Church. It gleaned one new volunteer.
Planning and Operations / Program Development
Alternative Shelter for Winter: A lot of energy is going into this presently. We are addressing every barrier: liability, insurance, protocols, etc.
Policies: Sarah has been working hard at this. Presently these are ready for viewing:
Background check letter
Background check policy
Check In Procedures
Disciplinary Charges
Harassment Policy
Grievance Policy
Volunteer Liability Form
Initial insurance quote $8000.00. A revised workers comp quote is $5500. but we’ve not got to the bottom of this yet. Initially ESG $$ was going to pay it, but when we were not providing shelter – the ESG was given to others. This will come from our own pocket this year.
138 Tenth – the plan currently is that the building come down April 15 and start going back up May 15. Patrick Smith estimated 4 months to build.
Insurance – workers comp, liability: A significant amount of time (~10 hrs.) one week alone spent resolving issues with insurance companies. Most of it was routine letters requiring “immediate responses or else” – except that arrived while I was gone. Each week there are new insurance issues. AHFC recently sent their requirements that must be in place to provide shelter. Oh joy!
Human Resources / Staff and Volunteer Development
Staffing:
Clearwater Counseling Family Support Counselor: We’ve had only a few nibbles. There is one we are following up on and have had one informal and one formal interview with. A second interview is set up 11/5/2012.
Shelter Supervisor and Shelter Assistants are all listed on Craigs List and Alexsys. We have had 6-7 people apply – but none qualified yet for Supervisor.
Thursdays I meet with Dave, then to FRM, then with Sarah and Dick.
Our office:
Dick’s car broke down in Wasilla and he missed a week of work trying to fix his car on his own dime. Linda Setterberg bought him a plane ticket and got him to Fairbanks Friday night. His Ford Escape needs towing from Wasilla to here. I am working on this. He has been very instrumental in researching and working through the planning and development of our present shelter plans.
Sarah represented us in Anchorage at the Ak Coalition on Housing & Homeless Conference 10th, 11th and 12th of Oct. They called and wanted an FYA rep to sit on a panel. They had stipends so we applied and received airfare and per diem for the 3 day conference.
Volunteer Development: We have potentially 25 volunteer applications at this time for overnight. We need more than that to start. Dick is developing a training. Ashton, another AmeriCorps member on loan to us from another agency, is an expert volunteer recruiter. Together – our AmeriCorps team will be responsible for recruiting, interviewing and approving volunteers.
Finances / Fiscal Oversight / Grant and Contract Management
I will be working on a draft 2013 budget with Brad’s help – not sure it will be completed by 10/29.
I submitted an Intent to Apply – for the BHAP and ESG money for 2013/2014 – see chart. The full grant will be due sometime in January.
Challenges with responding to donors this month ( a good problem to have) – this information is entered by hand and responded to via email and/or mail.
Fundraising / Donor Development
Fatbet total: $1800
One Homeless Night: $3928.99 has come in so far
One Homeless Night: 2013 – it would be cool to see this event grow and to include corporate and business leaders into the mix –
Donor Development: So far we have received 28 checks this month from new donors. All but one were related to One Homeless Night. So, though the fundraising from the two events this fall has been an awesome blessing – very few are making monthly contributions. This may change when we are actually providing shelter.
Golden Heart Literacy Council has provided us with a $1000.00 check to purchase E-readers and software/books for shelter.
Material Donations this month: rice cooker, new set of pots, new microwave, new crockpot, towels, hotel type supplies, shampoo, tooth paste, etc.
Walmart Grant:
“The Walmart Foundation and Facility # 2722 are pleased to inform you that your organization has been selected to receive a grant through the Local Community Contribution/Hunger Outreach Grant Program in the amount of $1,750.00. We believe that your organization is doing important work to the communities you serve, and we are proud that we are able to support you in your efforts.” Sarah was the primary writer of this. Yeah Sarah!
Board Development / Relations / Governance
There has been 2 inquiries from the community regarding the board, though at this time, I have received no applications.
We continue to stretch and grow. Patrick and I meet monthly to talk out the agenda. This process is fairly lengthy as we talk out the issues and figure out the best and most efficient use of board time and what are the pieces we are missing to help handle the load. Thanks for your patience and contributions!
