United Way of Northern Arizona — Getting Your Money Where It Needs to Go

At the heart of the United Way of Northern Arizona’s grant process is the Community Investment Fund, a volunteer-driven process that invests your donations into the proven programs, partnerships and initiatives that are changing lives in Coconino, Navajo and Apache counties every day.

Volunteers with the committee make a year-long commitment to review grant applications, evaluate programs and perform site visits.

“As a member of the Community Investment Team, I get to see first-hand how UWNA brings together community partners and leverages resources to support our local non-profit agencies,” said Tami Suchowiejko, who is with Coconino County and one of the three newest CI team members.

Also joining our force of almost 40 volunteers are Eve Ford of Eve Ford Consulting and Sue Hilgart of Navajo County. The volunteers are broken up into seven teams, five in Flagstaff and one each in Page and northeast Arizona.

Ford said that the impact of COVID-19 motivated her to join the CI team.

“During the pandemic, a lot of organizations have been severely impacted and some shut down,” said Ford. “I decided to volunteer with UWNA to help nonprofits get stronger and better as they serve the people of Flagstaff.”

Recommendations by the CI Team are just the first step of the approval process. Proposed community investments are reviewed by the UWNA Finance Committee, with the final funding decisions made by the full Board of Directors.

UWNA is currently recruiting additional members for the Community Investment Team. If you are interested, you can find more information at Volunteer Hub.

KinderCamp™ is a targeted early intervention school readiness program designed to help preschoolers ages 4-5, with the foundational, social, and academic skills necessary for a successful start to kindergarten.

You can help get this year’s KinderCamp started by volunteering next Thursday, April 29, to assemble activity kits for the program. We’ll be at the Flagstaff Unified School District Administration Office, 3285 Sparrow Ave. from 8 am to 1 pm.

You can come for all or part of the time. Lunch will be included and we ask that all volunteers wear masks. Call the UWNA office at (928) 773-9813 for questions and you can sign up at Volunteer Hub.

Donate to the United Way of Northern Arizona today and help fund agency partner programs through Community Investment Fund grants and initiatives like KinderCamp.