Beyond Bread: Vacation Roundup

I may take a vacation from time to time, but Bread for the City never does. All last week the Internet busted up with news. We'll have the full roundup later this week, but here are the Bread for the City stories I missed (oops):

~With the election over, non-profits are writing all kinds of letters to President-Elect Obama. Bread for the City has been asked to sign on to many of the aforementioned missives, and (as you might expect) we have ladled our support onto only the best and brightest. One such letter has made its way onto the series of tubes we call the Internet. Bread for the city is proud to support The National Coalition of Women of Color in Construction (in partnership with WOW and Women Work!) as they ensure the necessary infrastructure jobs that will be created will include a healthy dose of women.

~Dr. Miller, a former board member and long-time friend, posted a very nice write-up about us on his Health Policy and Communications blog. Bread for the City has been taking a number of steps over the last couple of years to make our finances completely transparent. As an organization that works on behalf of the community, it only makes sense that the community should have an opportunity to see exactly how their money is being spent. We're fortunate to have a very smart Finance Director, Karen Nathan, who makes sure all our donations are spent in a responsible way that we can all be proud of.

~One of our long-time partners, Youthworks!, featured us on their budding Wordpress blog. Youthworks! is an organization that matches groups who are looking for volunteer opportunities with non-profits who desperately need the help. They've agreed to send us volunteers every Tuesday starting in June. Organizations like Youthworks! are crucial to Bread for the City since they give us volunteers we can depend on and allow me to schedule very far in advance. We also partner with YSOP, One Brick, Greater DC Cares, and a number of other volunteer recruiters to make sure our staff gets the support they need. We couldn't serve so many low-income residents without their help.

~Kathryn Baer's blog, Policy & Poverty, picked up Greg's story about WMATA phasing out paper transfers. I added her to my google reader today, and look forward to reading the other stories she picks up.

~Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post wrote a couple sentences on our ongoing partnership with Dickstein Shapiro. Dickstein gives a great deal of financial support to us every year, but they also do pro bono work through our legal clinic and, when we moved into Anacostia in 2002 they established our legal clinic there. To this day, that office of 6 full-time staff still bears their name. It's hard to express just how much of an impact Dickstein Shapiro has had on Bread for the City and the community at-large, but they were given the National Capital Philanthropy Day's Outstanding Corporate Partner award earlier this year in recognition of all that they do. They certainly deserve it and much more.

~A number of groups donated food during Holiday Helpings to help us feed families in need. One such group was ASEA & The Center, which donated full holiday meals for a whopping 78 families!! A gigantic thanks to ASEA & The Center for such a tremendous outpouring of support. You can view their pictures on flickr.