King County Journal - April 20, 2002

The Good News about Community Services
Pamela Mauk
Family Resource Center

Did we forget to tell you the good news?

That's been on the mind of many providing community services for the Eastside lately. As we worry about the future of King County and State funding, and watch as key services are threatened, a question has been forming.

Did we forget to tell you about all the good things that have been happening in your community thanks to the partnership of community and government leaders, donors, and volunteers? Did we forget to remind you of what you mean to your community?  What together we have achieved?

At Family Resource Center, the Eastside's human services campus, we see and hear a tremendous amount of good news. We learn about people whose lives have changed for the better. We see our community's compassion in the actions of volunteers, the advocacy of community leaders and in our own community success story.

First: the good news about "clients."  You might ask: does anything actually improve with all the funds directed to health and human services?  What actually changes?  The answer: for those in crisis, often everything.   Habitat for Humanity of East King County, for example, doesn't simply build homes, it creates stable upbringings for scores of our neighbors' children.  Eastside Community Health Center's dental clinic does not only save the teeth of the poor as a kindness, but keeps potential employment
doors open. Seattle Mental Health's provision of stabilizing medications to an underprivileged schizophrenic is not only a suitable course of medical treatment, but also the starting place to enabling a quality life and a contribution to our community. When Friends of Youth finds a better home than the local bridge for a homeless teen, the spin-off benefits are difficult to count.

Who ensures that helping services are available? Above all, you do. With your tax contributions. With your yearly donations. With your time.  You make sure our community is healthy, caring and dynamic by insisting that services are available to care for our neighbors and ourselves. You are often on hand to bring a human touch to these services.

Here on the Family Resource Center campus, we see that intense community spirit. Volunteers provide strategic planning on boards of directors or give a warm welcome to families in need of a bag of food. Volunteers teach children how to put on bike helmets. They mentor teen parents, providing an ally during a difficult time. Volunteers read to children whose parents are receiving low-cost medical care. They build homes. They raise funds.

We are reminded of your community involvement each year as we mount our Eastside Volunteer Fair. This casual, drop-in, have-an-appetizer-and-enjoy-the-jazz evening is fun and lively, but people come with a serious intent. They want to plug into their community and make a difference. (You can join us this year from 4 pm to 7 pm on Tuesday, April 23. Almost three dozen health and human services organizations from throughout the Eastside will be on hand.)

Yes, there is lots of good news about our community services.  Do you know how to direct your elderly Chinese-speaking neighbor to translation services? Do you know how to find alcohol and drug abuse counseling for a daughter?  Where would you find employment counseling for a sibling?  The good news: you can call the community information line at 206-461-3200 and talk to someone who knows how to find appropriate services anywhere in King County. Yes. Thanks to community support, it's that simple.

Finally, our own good news.  The Eastside has a unique human services hub that finds us the envy of many regions around the Sound and throughout the nation. A little more than a decade ago, community visionaries, corporate and government funders and volunteers created Family Resource Center, the Eastside's human services campus.  Today, 35,000 Eastsiders each year (and another 10,000 from throughout the state) find help from 20 independent agencies working in one convenient three-building campus in downtown Redmond.

What does this tell us?  First, people need services.  That's a fact of life.

Secondly, thanks to community support in the form of government funding, donations and volunteer support, services are available on the Eastside that make an enormous difference to individuals and to the quality of life in our community.

That's the good news! Pass it on. 

Pamela Mauk is executive director of Family Resource Center, the Eastside's human services campus, and serves on the board of Eastside Human Services Alliance. She can be reached at pamm@familyresourcecenter.org.

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