Missouri Slope Areawide United Way Inc

Ending hunger in our community one way that msa united way fights hunger is by administering the united way backpack program, providing approximately 1,700 backpacks every other weekend full of food to students in bismarck-mandan and outlying rural communities. In 2024, meals were provided to approximately 1700+ at-risk youth to end weekend hunger. Msa united way recruited and coordinated approximately 600 volunteers to serve daily meals in 11 parks during the summer to combat summer hunger. Together with our partners, approximately 63,000 children, adults, and seniors now have access to healthy meals.

Homeless shelter in october of 2017, a major local emergency homeless shelter shut down, leaving many without needed food, shelter, and resources. United way stepped in after being asked to provide emergency shelter throughout the frigid winter months. United way purchased property with a partner in 2019 to build a permanent shelter for the community, serving men, women, and families. Msa united way re-opened our doors during the daytime hours in december 2022 and has been the only 24/7 emergency shelter in the region, saving lives, especially on days with windchill as cold as -50. The new facility, called the center for opportunity, began serving residents on june 1, 2023. The goal of the center is to bring a multitude of services onsite, such as behavioral health case management, childcare, career readiness training, housing assistance, and financial literacy counseling. The new facility provides safe space for families with children, as well as victims of domestic violence. Additionally, msa united way provided hotel rooms and care to covid-positive homeless clients and continued to facilitate access to covid-19 testing prior to admission into the shelter to keep all residents safe.

Expenses paid for community service projects. Included in community services is the dolly parton imagination library administered by united way and other smaller community service projects. The dolly parton imagination library is a program administered at no cost by msa united way where free books are mailed monthly to the homes of local children ages 0-5 each month. In 2024, 40,357 books were delivered to thousands of local preschoolers across a 10-county region.