Look, Ma! No Hoops!

Marilyn, my CIC co-chair at United Way, said yesterday, "I don't see how they are going to do all this [carry out an ambitious proposal] unless someone on that staff grows a gill."

I burst out laughing. Brandon, our United Way president, gave her this look and repeated, "grow a gill?" And with Marilyn's statement and our responses, I knew we had officially crossed into United Way March Madness.

As I wrote last year, for those of us who volunteer as Impact Team members for United Way of Delaware County, March is not about tournament brackets, Cinderella teams, or the Final Four. Rather, it is about reading funding proposals, two weeks of agency site visits, and team meetings that run up to three hours while we discuss the merits of the proposals.

Today was Day Two (and the final day) of those marathon team meetings.

As a warm-up exercise both days, Tracy, who is Community Impact Manager for United Way, had us go around the room, introduce ourselves, and throw out one word that described the Impact Team process:

Enlightening

Difficult

Educational

Baffling

Demanding

Thorough

Surprising

Overwhelming

Rewarding

Confusing

Enriching

Excellent

Challenging

Empowering

The Impact Team process is all of those words and more. It is an uplifting and humbling experience. Every year I come out of March in awe of the strength of this community.

I also come away punch drunk from the wackiness that envelops those of us closest to the process. Prior to this week, our volunteers conducted agency site visits. Yesterday and today, some 30+ volunteers reviewed 39 proposals over the course of four separate Impact Team meetings. Marilyn, Brandon, Tracy, and I attended all four meetings, read all 39 proposals, and between us, made sure that at least two of us (one CIC co-chair and one staff member) attended each site visit.

Little wonder we all get a little tipsy on United Way March Madness.

There was a lot of laughter yesterday and today. We get silly. This morning when Tracy gave her word, "grateful," she added "for all of you volunteers," then threw out "I love you guys!" in an Academy Award winning baritone. I looked at Brandon, who had yet to give his word, and said "top that." Rod, who works for Nationwide and is a veteran volunteer himself, pointed out the role Red Cross fills at local disasters, such as house fires. "Who's the first on the scene?," Rod asked, before answering, "Besides a Nationwide adjuster, that is." Another volunteer opined how unsettling it was as to how much personal information could be gathered easily from the internet. I said, deadpan, "I know. I look you up all the time!" Marilyn, describing an agency site visit and some of the volunteer comments, said, "well, it wasn't like acid reflux when we suggested it."

I'm going to miss United Way March Madness.

This is my fifth and final year as an Impact Team volunteer. I've had a long tenure, by local United Way standards, and I am grateful for that. I've loved it. I've loved getting to know my community even better than I had ever imagined possible. I've loved working with so many other volunteers from all parts of the county and many walks of life, some of whom have become friends beyond our United Way confines. I've loved serving as CIC co-chair, despite the extra hours and extra commitment.

I will help lead the CIC meeting in mid-April, at which we make our funding recommendations, and I will make the presentation to the United Way Board the last Monday in April. And then I'm done. It will be time to pass the senior leadership into Marilyn's steady, capable hands. Like me, she will be fortunate beyond words to have Brandon and Tracy alongside her for next year's Impact Team process. And Marilyn has an excellent sense of humor, which will serve her well.

When my friend Kermit is truly impressed by someone's character, he will say, "there are not enough words in the dictionary to adequately describe" his admiration of the person. I'm going to borrow that phrase from Kermit as we ring down the curtain on our March United Way season. Brandon, Tracy, and Marilyn, there are not enough words in the dictionary to adequately describe my admiration and gratitude for your commitment and energy. You, and all the Impact Team volunteers, have made yet another March a success, and I have been fortunate beyond words to have shared the experience with you.

See you April 17.

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.