LIVE UNITED with Orange County United Way.

United Way is about building self-sufficient lives for the health of our community.

We do that through our Strategic Assessment Process, which thoroughly evaluates local human care services to ensure your contribution supports the most effective programs to help build self-sufficient lives in Orange County.

To achieve this goal, we focus on two approaches:

First: We support a safety-net of care to ensure that essential needs, such as food, shelter and medical care are met today

Second: We support solutions for long-term change focused on education and financial stability to move people from dependency to self-sufficiency tomorrow

Community Impact means providing individuals and families in crisis with basic needs today and supporting long-term solutions for self-sufficiency tomorrow. Orange County United Way does this by maximizing charitable dollars to have the greatest impact on the quality of life in our community.

Community Impact Priorities

Basic Needs: Now, more than ever before, Orange County families and individuals are in need of the most essential services including food, shelter and medical care. This past year we saw requests for food more than double over the previous year and requests for housing and rental assistance went up more than 40 percent. United Way is committed to supporting programs providing essential services to ensure Orange County residents live healthy, stable lives with independence and dignity.

Education: United Way supports programs for children and youth to prepare them academically, socially and emotionally to grow to be independent adults. The future of our children begins with their education and we are committed to supporting strategies that enable our children to reach their full potential.

Financial Stability: United Way supports financial education and job development programs that allow individuals to acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to attain financial independence.

The current state of our local and national economy has intensified the growing needs in Orange County. Families and individuals are searching to meet their most basic of needs including food, shelter, medical care and emergency services in ways our community has never experienced before.

2-1-1 Emergency Hotline Reports staggering increases in service requests in the last year:

• ·         98% increase in requests for food (5,464 calls since July 2008).

  ·         42% increase in requests for rental assistance (6,112 calls since July 2008).

  ·         77% increase in requests for legal assistance (1,462 calls since July 2008).

  ·         84% increase in requests for counseling (2,170 calls since July 2008).

In addition to ensuring a safety-net of care, Orange County United Way also supports solutions for long-term change focused on education and financial stability to move people from dependency to self-sufficiency.

• Our partners include 1,200 Orange County businesses, schools and local city, state and federal governments and human service providers, and over 80 local agencies to leverage our strengths as a community to provide a safety-net of care and to provide long-lasting solutions of the human care issues in Orange County.

Call 2-1-1 Orange County by dialing 211 on your phone (or 888-600-4357), the official information and referral service of Orange County United Way. Or you can refer to our list of Funded Programs and Partnerships on our website, which lists the Orange County United Way funded network of partner organizations, as well as the programs and services they provide.

Orange County United Way focuses on bottom line results - changing lives and strengthening communities. By providing strong leadership, accountability and measurable results, we are able to positively change the quality of people’s lives, while striving to keep our overhead at, or below, 20%.