Black River United Way’s annual Volunteer Fair kicks off fundraising campaign

Black River United Way’s fundraising drive kicks off Wednesday (today) in Georgetown with the second annual Volunteer Fair for 21 nonprofits. The fair will be in the Beck Recreation Center from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Prior to the fair, employee campaign coordinators will meet in the center with United Way executive director Lucy Woodhouse.

Forty-six employee campaign coordinators have been invited to the event. They are the leaders of campaigns in businesses, leading to employees contributions through payroll deductions, a vital part of United Way fundraising. The financial goal of the campaign is $500,000.

The 21 nonprofits at the Volunteer Fair include Growing Great Readers, a critical part of one of the United Way’s main initiatives, third grade reading. AmeriCorps workers will work with volunteers in several Georgetown and Williamsburg County elementary schools.

The United Way itself will have a table at the fair seeking volunteers for its Day of Caring on Sept. 22. Yolanda McCray, director of community impact, says schools and nonprofit organizations may apply, through Friday, for six remaining mini-grants supporting Day of Caring. The 25 grants were available to all nonprofits and schools in Georgetown and Williamsburg counties. As of Tuesday, 19 had received grants.

Black River United Way has initiatives are: Connecting the Community, including services such as 2-1-1 and emergency food programs; and Third Grade Reading, which aims to have all youngsters reading at grade level by the time they enter 4th grade. In November, a tri-county program, “United to Read,” is expected to impact more than 6,000 youngsters. United Way of Horry County is a partner with BRUW in United to Read.

Black River’s other main initiatives include Long Term Recovery and Career Readiness and Work Force Development. Recovery alludes to the flooding of October 2015; Woodhouse expects as many as 3,000 volunteers to be involved in “Eight Days of Hope” that will have the capacity to repair 250 homes damaged by flooding.

Wednesday’s Volunteer Fair is an effort “to link businesses with the community, to learn how [employers and employees] can help nonprofits,” McCray says. Organizations signed up for the event include A Father’s Place, which serves Horry County as well as Georgetown and Williamsburg. Freedom Readers and Tara Hall are also scheduled to be at the fair.

Others at the fair include Family Justice Center, AMI Kids, Georgetown County Library System, Goodwill Industries, St. Frances Animal Shelter, Habitat for Humanity, Hobcaw Barony & Belle Baruch Foundation, Sadie Cares, Family Connection of S.C., Miss Ruby’s Kids, Teach My People, Service Over Self, Carolina Human Reinvestment, Optimism Prevention Services and the federal Internal Revenue Service seeking people for VITA, Volunteer Income Tax Assistance.

This story was originally published September 6, 2016 at 3:58 PM with the headline "Black River United Way’s annual Volunteer Fair kicks off fundraising campaign."