A Brief History of United Way of Missoula County

United Way of Missoula County has been serving this community under a variety of different names since March of 1931, when the Federated Social Services of Missoula County was formed. At the helm, charting its original course, was Bill Gallagher, well respected local philanthropist. The goal, soon achieved, was to raise $28,000.

Federated Social Services adopted the name Community Chest in the late 1930s. During the 1940s and 1950s, amounts raised grew to more than $60,000 annually. Eighty-five percent of the money raised went to four Missoula agencies: Boy Scouts, Camp Fire Girls, YWCA and the Salvation Army.

In 1963, the name Community Chest was changed to United Givers. The old concept of agencies managing the organizations to raise funds for them was replaced by a new purpose: that of givers joining together to determine which agencies receive funding. Throughout the 1960s, over $100,000 was raised each year and new agencies supported, included Montana Association for the Blind, Catholic Charities and Lutheran Social Services.

In the 1970s, our organization raised about $200,000 and supported more new agencies, including the Crisis Center, Multiple Sclerosis Association, Seeley-Ovando-Swan Health Center, Law Enforcement Youth Camp and Day Care Scholarship Fund. The most significant change to United Givers was an affiliation with a growing national movement, and a name change to United Way of Missoula County. We joined an association of more than 1,400 other United Ways across the United States. United Way was defined as "A community project, locally organized and supported, with two primary purposes: 1) raising money each year in a single campaign and 2) seeing that this money was wisely allocated and carefully used."

Today, United Way of America is the nation's largest charity, raising $4 billion annually. Its mission -- to improve lives by harnessing the caring power of communities -- sets a leadership example for our local chapter to follow.

During the 1980s, local campaign goals exceeded the $400,000 mark. At the request of experienced campaigners, we implemented a team fund-raising structure. The teams included Commerce and Industry, Government, Education, Retirees, Medical and 125 volunteers from supported agencies for the Sales Division. Big Brothers & Sisters of Missoula, Missoula Developmentally Disabled, Community Homes Council and Missoula Senior Citizens Centers were newly funded agencies during this decade.

Today United Way of Missoula County supports 33 different programs providing critical prevention and safety-net services to people in our community. Organizations are screened carefully to make sure that donors' dollars do what they intend them to do: provide food, shelter, help and hope to needy people in Missoula County.

United Way of Missoula County invests in high-quality programs that produce measurable results; programs like Youth Homes, Watson Children's Shelter, Missoula Food Bank, the Poverello Center, the Parenting Place and the Flagship Program in the public schools. We also were the driving force behind the creation of 211, our community's human service referral line, where callers in need of help are referred to organizations and programs that can provide it. We understand and educate the community on key human-service issues like child neglect, homelessness, hunger, health care. We serve as a community trustee for donors interested in giving to an efficient, one-stop charitable entity in touch with Missoula County's health and human service needs, and we collaborate with diverse partners to create lasting improvements in community conditions.

Our 2006 campaign raised a record $1,258,000 to help those most in need in our community. And our independent subsidiary, United Way of Ravalli County, which is growing every year and fostering its own identity in the Bitterroot, allocated almost $30,000 last year to organizations providing services to needy people in Ravalli County.

The year 2007 marks another one of transition and change for United Way of Missoula County. Our longtime CEO, Judy Wing, stepped down in late 2006 after 25 years of service. Her successor, Susan Hay Cramer, is building on Judy's accomplishments and implementing her vision of a United Way that measures its success not by whether the organization achieves its fundraising goal, but by what kind of lasting impact we have in the lives of poor, hungry, homeless and vulnerable people in our community. This "community impact model" calls upon United Way to focus its fundraising efforts not solely on a time-limited workplace campaign bolstered by payroll deductions, but on building and sustaining strong, lasting relationships with diverse supporters.

Our first community impact initiative, "Missoula Kids Matter^TM," is focused on preventing child abuse and neglect. It was developed by a United Way-convened Task Force on Child Neglect that included some of the best minds working on these issues in the county: nonprofit agencies, child advocates, the police and sheriff's departments, the school system, health care providers. The initiative's focus is based on the work of national organizations whose family-strengthening models have successfully reduced child abuse and neglect in communities around the country. We intend to implement those models here in Missoula.

In partnership with donors, funded agencies, and diverse partners throughout our community, United Way of Missoula County aspires for excellence in our day-to-day work as we strive to achieve our goals of community excellence, measurable impact and improved lives.

Pictured (left to right, top row): Judy Wahlberg, RE/Max Realty Consultants; John Stenger, Insured Titles LLC; Vice President Scott Stearns, Boone Karlberg PC; Daniel E. Kiely, Merrill Lynch, Past President Richard Huffman, St. Patrick Hospital and Science Center; Steve Patrick, Roscoe Steel & Culvert Co.; Doug Harrison, Mountain Water Co; President Robert Homer, Bitterroot Motors; Tina Begay, American Indian Business Leaders.

Pictured (left to right, bottom row): Patrick Clevenger, Smurfit-Stone Container Corp; Lynda L. Brown, Tamarack Management, Inc; Dean Skaja, Smurfit-Stone Container Corp Local 885; Carol Williams, Worden Thane PC; Sandy Volkmann, Volkmann Woodworking; Treasurer John Horner, First Interstate Bank; 2008 Campaign Chair Susan J. Muralt, Business Owner.

Not Pictured: Mark D. Burke, Mark D. Burke & Associates; Stephen Carlson, Community Medical Center; Richard Dailey, University of Montana (retired); Stacey Mueller, Missoulian; Andrea Vernon, University of Montana; UWRC President Gina Wilson, Bitterroot Disposal.