United Way Hopes Fund-Raising Drive Will Heat Up Soon

Judging by the thermometer tracking this year’s United Way campaign in Ventura County, it looks like winter in Wisconsin.

But officials say things will heat up fast and soon.

Frantically raising money for a campaign that is six months shorter than past years--yet aims to raise almost as much money--United Way officials announced Thursday that $607,111 has been pledged in the campaign’s first 34 days.

But to reach its goal of raising $5.5 million by Dec. 15, United Way must secure about $87,500 in pledges per day.

President Sheryl Wiley Solomon said she is confident United Way will achieve its goal and that this week’s progress report understates the amount already raised. Only about 10% of participating companies have reported their tallies.

Many companies, she said, have not adjusted to this year’s compressed campaign schedule and may be waiting until its end to report how much their employees have pledged. United Way prefers that companies update their totals more often.

“If they’re sitting on the results, that’s a problem,” Wiley Solomon said. “We want them to report them as we’re going through our weekly and biweekly reports.”

Some companies may not be able to report their totals by the campaign’s end in December. Some of those contributors, Wiley Solomon said, are branches of corporations headquartered elsewhere.

In those cases, the local branch completes its campaign on schedule but must first report its employees’ pledges to the central office. If the headquarters’ campaign runs on a different schedule, United Way in Ventura County might not get a tally for several months.

Still other firms, especially those that are busy during the holiday season, might not have time to ask their employees to give to charity. Those firms’ pledges will come in after the year’s end, she predicted.

Then there are the individuals who contribute to United Way. Wiley Solomon said many of them wait to pledge until the last two weeks of December, after this campaign’s official end but before the Dec. 31 deadline for tax purposes.

Last year, United Way, which provides financial aid to 59 local charities, fell $500,000 short of its $5.7-million goal and had to cut $300,000 in funding for member agencies.

Among those affected was the Boys & Girls Club of Oxnard and Port Hueneme, which lost $56,000, had to cut two positions and mount its own fund-raising campaign to fill the gap.

Wiley Solomon said no member agency should worry that United Way won’t be able to come through with funding this year.

The American Red Cross of Ventura County received $175,000 from United Way’s last campaign.

Red Cross Executive Director Ann Sobel said she expects this year’s drive to hit its target.

“I think it’s going to be tight in terms of time,” Sobel said, “but I have no doubt the goal will be met because of the strong support within Ventura County.”

As for United Way’s recent $600,000 tally, Sobel is not discouraged.

“Two-thirds of the businesses haven’t even run their campaigns yet, so the bulk is yet to be complete,” she said. “Many of those are the larger employers.”

Sobel applauded Ventura County’s United Way for shortening its campaign season.

From Wiley Solomon’s experience, shorter campaigns can be very successful. In St. Louis, where she worked before coming to Ventura County two years ago, $57 million is pledged in only eight weeks.

Locally, she said, “it’s going to take us awhile to really explain the benefits of doing this and getting the companies and the community into the habit of working in this time frame.”

United Way opted to reduce its campaign from nine months to 90 days this year in an effort to increase its visibility as well as the odds of reaching its financial target.

“It’s very difficult to run an aggressive campaign over a nine-month period because the public loses interest,” Wiley Solomon said.

In addition, dragging out the campaign meant decisions about how to allocate the money occurred before all pledges were received.

“We want to make sure that our dollars are known by the time we make our allocations,” she said.

United Way will take another thermometer reading Nov. 19. Wiley Solomon predicted that the agency will report at least $1 million at that time.

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Times Community News reporter Nick Green contributed to this report.