March Madness Without the Hoops

Some people spend huge portions of March watching basketball, planning their work and their recreation around the games that winnow 64 teams to the Sweet Sixteen, the Great Eight, the Final Four, and then the last two teams standing. People pay into office pools, pack the sports bars, stock up on sodas and chips and anything else that can be consumed for tournament parties. If your favorite team was in some weird timeslot (meaning anything on the west coast), you may have found yourself sacrificing sleep and sanity and ranting, like my friend Karen did, the next day on Facebook: “[I am] so sad (and tired!) after staying up to watch VCU Rams lose by ONE STINKIN' POINT! :( ”

Some of us here in D-Town recently went through our own form of March madness, centered not on basketball but on the annual United Way agency review process. I have been involved with this for four years now, serving as a reader and scorer both at the grassroots level (the Impact Team) and the funding recommendation level (the Community Impact Council, or CIC). In a “normal” year, this means I would read and score several proposals and participate in two or three agency site visits over the course of two weeks, and attend one three hour meeting in March with my other Impact Team members to discuss the proposals in our impact area. Then, in April, I would meet with the entire CIC to discuss funding recommendations.

This year I co-chaired the CIC and my March became madness without the benefit of hoops, 3 point shots, or ESPN.

When you are co-chair of the CIC, you are responsible for not knowing just your own impact team (Health) but all of the UW impact areas: Health, Youth, Housing, Seniors and Core (essential community needs, like a food pantry). That means reading and scoring all of the proposals and splitting the site visits (I think there were 26 this year) with Bill, my co-chair. (He too read all of the proposals.) Just completing the two weeks of agency site visits was an accomplishment.

This week, now wonderfully ended, was Impact Team meetings week. Every morning at 9:00, the Impact Team of the day volunteers, Brandon (UW President), Tracy (Impact Team Coordinator), Bill and I met in a basement conference room and plowed through the proposals. Most days went two and a half hours, one team went three (lots of proposals, lots of discussion). Fueled on coffee and doughnuts and community passions, we talked and critiqued and agonized and debated where the needs and the dollars were. All of the agencies are feeling the lash of the Great Recession and we were all painfully aware that the needs are greater than ever while the dollars are not. The discussion stayed positive and constructive, a testament to the commitment of the volunteers.

The national slogan of United Way is Live United. Earlier in the year, Tracy asked us to give her some comments of how we put the slogan into action. I wrote that I lived United because I believe our community is strongest when we all come together. This week was living proof of that. If there was ever a community model that works, it is our local United Way’s review process.

In the end, Brandon, Tracy, Bill and I were so immersed in the process that we were slap-happy by Thursday and downright punch-drunk by the last session. The review process marked my dreams and dogged my days. It was Friday when I announced that I had dubbed this week “March Madness Without the Hoops.”

After the last session ended and we all staggered out, I walked home, giddy at it being over. What a great week! What an absolutely energizing, exhausting, draining, and uplifting week! I am deeply impressed by and grateful to all who participated, especially Brandon and Tracy of United Way and my co-chair Bill. My deep thanks to those three (and to all the volunteers) for their work, their dedication, and their vision, collectively and singularly.

You made this week sing for me.