United Way exceeds campaign

The United Way of Steele County had plenty of reasons to celebrate 2024 – not the least of which was its most successful fundraising campaign ever.

The organization smashed its $815,000 goal, collecting $837,924. The money will be distributed to 20 partner agencies and more than 30 direct services programs.

Representatives of four of the agencies spoke during the celebration last week at the VFW in Owatonna.               

Michelle Redman, executive director of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southern Minnesota, said the group served 913 one-to-one mentoring matches in its five-county area in 2024; 540 were in Steele County.

With a 100% satisfaction rate from Bigs, Littles and their families, it’s no surprise there’s a waiting list of 340 children looking for “mentors, role models, and most importantly, friends to the youth in the community,” Redman said.

Edna Ringhofer, of Healthy Seniors, said her volunteers and caregivers were able to divert 441 months of nursing home placements in 2024 by using resources to help seniors stay safely in their homes.

With the help of United Way and other partner agencies, she said, Healthy Seniors served 1,594 seniors and caregivers.

Julie Anderson, the executive director of Steele County Transitional Housing, shared several success stories of people the local organization has helped, with the assistance of United Way.

Previously unhoused people have gone on to own homes, further their education, find successful careers and pay it forward to those currently struggling, she said.

The work is ongoing, however: 162 children in the Owatonna School District are experiencing homelessness.

“It’s amazing what we can accomplish to stabilize families,” Anderson said. “Thank you for being the people we’ve been waiting for.”

Dom Korbel, executive director of Community Pathways of Steele County, had members of a youth group he leads help with his presentation.

They suggested he use ChatGPT  to learn about community resiliency.

The app, using artificial intelligence, described it like this:

Community resiliency refers to a community’s ability to adapt, recover and thrive in the face of challenges … It involves the collective strength, resources and support system that help a community withstand and bounce back.

“If that’s not a perfect description of what United Way makes all of us, I don’t know what is,” Korbel said.

In 2024, Community Pathways distributed 2.3 million pounds of food that served more than 4,300 families at least once. Nearly 2,000 families “joined us for the first time ever,” Korbel said, a growth rate of about 40%.

“You need to know that the eyes of the state of Minnesota are on us,” he told the crowd. “They’re on us in Steele County, because we are leading the way in the battle against hunger that they’re measuring, and they’re asking us how we’re doing it.”

The state uses a metric that measures the effectiveness of communities that are battling hunger, Korbel explained.

“Up until 2022, Rochester led that metric – and led it by a mile,” he said. “In 2023 and 2024, we led that metric. In southern Minnesota, no city, no county does a better job of getting food to people who need it than we do here.

“The collective is how you create community resilience,” Korbel said; Community Pathways sees it through fundraising, referrals, the United Way and volunteers.

“In 2024, we had 1,005 people volunteer with us for at least one hour,” he said. “The total volunteer hours given to us as a gift of time and talent was 29,000.”

It’s not just adults, though, as Kellen Hinrichsen and Jeff Elstad reminded the attendees.

Hinrichsen is the donor development coordinator for UWSC; Elstad is superintendent of the Owatonna School District, which was the community campaign leader this year.

About 7:20 one morning, Hinrichsen was surrounded by about 100 students at OHS, “and we came together and came up with a way to support the United Way. Afterward, when I spoke with the staff, they said, ‘this is not on us … this is all the students,’” he said.

“They came together to find a way that they could support the community, that they could give back, and they raised thousands of dollars by themselves in a single day,” Hinrichsen said. “It made me realize the future is bright – and we are in good hands.”

That’s no accident, Elstad said, and it’s about more than money.

“Those examples that you set as a community – why do you think our high school kids are able to raise a thousand dollars or more in a very short period of time? Because they have adults that they look up to that do the same thing,” he said.

“Without the support that the United Way of Steele County puts in place, some of our students and families would find it really difficult to even be at school, so I’m grateful to our community that continues to lean into our students,” Elstad said. “I'm also grateful for a community that leans in and continues to be the example of what true giving means.

“So I’m here to tell you, don’t stop that giving, because the next generation of givers? Their eyes are on you,” he said. “They’re watching what you do, they’re watching what you say, and when you give of your time and your talents and your dollars, it sets an example for them that they want to live up to.”

Annette Duncan, president of UWSC, received a standing ovation.

Among the resources provided under her leadership, volunteers last year helped file 450 tax returns, “putting more than $500,000 back into the hands of people who needed it most,” she said.

The group also secured $300,000 to purchase land to build affordable housing, which will be built within the next two or three years.

Her work continues: The goal for 2025 is to raise $950,000.

“I know it sounds like a lot,” Duncan said, “but we’re going to make it happen.”