Area nonprofits are facing potential service cuts due to the significant reduction or loss of United Way support.
Foodlink, Jewish Family Services Rochester and Baden Street Settlement are among those confirming they were effectively defunded by United Way, and will not receive any money after Jan. 1. Charles Settlement House and Community Place of Greater Rochester will see a reduction of roughly 90% in multi-year funding, officials said.
Notifications were made Aug. 1 involving what is known as the Community Impact Fund.
"The need has never been greater here in our region, and yet the math simply doesn't add up," said Jaime Saunders, president and CEO of the United Way of Greater Rochester and the Finger Lakes. "This is a painful reality that we cannot commit dollars we simply do not have, and shines a light on this unfortunate shift that is a community problem, and in which we need to come together, because it's simply not sustainable."
Saunders cited what has been a nationwide downturn in individual giving that started during the pandemic. The organization has been scrambling in recent years to cover $2 million or larger funding gaps between what it could raise, and what it had committed in multi-year grants.
What is being seen now is a right-sizing that is necessary, Saunders said, while recognizing: "This is a crisis moment for our nonprofit leaders."
United Way notified nonprofits on Friday morning that it plans to take out a loan and provide $2 million in bridge funding. How that money will be doled out will be determined after Labor Day, officials said. But it will be for operational support, not tied to programs.
In a statement Thursday, Catholic Charities did not address the impact of lost funding but spoke of “a significant change” in United Way’s competitive grant process, adding that it was working with other agencies to find solutions.
United Way had told nonprofits that it had less money coming in, and thus less money to award, officials said. On its website, the organization explained that the Community Impact multi-year grant program would award approximately $6 million for funding in 2025. That is down from $11 million in recent years, but United Way said that larger number was an over-commitment by the organization based on fundraising targets not what it had on hand.
This year, the organization is committing 55% of the target for multi-year grants with the rest yet to be raised but targeted for other funding streams.
Also different this year, the local United Way used a blind evaluation process, removing the names of the nonprofits' and programs from all 279 applications, officials said.
When award recipients are announced next week, the list will include 36 organizations that had not previously received United Way funding, officials said.
Those that lost funding are, in some cases, the sole provider of crisis services, had the largest capacity to reach the most people, and were counting on the United Way funding to secure larger federal and other outside grants — making the financial impact of United Way's decisions potentially that much bigger.
For Foodlink, the reduction in United Way support translates to a loss of more than $200,000 come next year.
"As the sole food bank responsible for serving all of the counties within the United Way's service area, this loss of funding could not come at a worse time,” read a statement Foodlink released Thursday evening. “Food prices remain high and food insecurity is on the rise.”
The money is passed through to help stock the shelves and support more than 170 member nonprofits and dozens of other food distribution partners. Foodlink saw visits to its network of food pantries and meal programs increase 35% through the first half of this year compared to 2023 — putting the agency "on pace for more requests for food assistance than ever before in our 45-year history,” the statement continued.
"But Foodlink is a resilient organization and this is a resilient community,” the statement concluded, “we will continue to look for ways to meet the rising need despite the loss of this critical funding.”
Separately, United Way decided not to renew funding for family services and after-school programming led by Baden Street and Charles settlement houses, and The Community Place of Greater Rochester, those agencies said in a joint statement.
“These programs serve neighborhoods in Rochester that have some of the highest poverty rates in the state and nation,” the statement read. “Our settlement houses have helped people meet their basic needs for over 100 years, and we are some of the first places people turn when they are in crisis. With the high cost of food, the number of people needing assistance in our community continues to climb. A reduction in services of this magnitude is a blow to the entire infrastructure of our community’s safety net.”
