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Our Vision Councils have been steadfast in their
charge for 2008. The 3 Vision Councils and what's hot on their
agenda are as follows:
Vision for Families and Children in
Salem County
Build a community prevention network that
fosters the building of skills and knowledge needed for strong
family and child development. This Vision Council distributes a
Parenting Guide including its recently developed DVD with helpful parenting hints.
This group also holds Parenting Forums which
offered something for everyone. There are a variety of workshops to choose
from along with games & play for the children.
The Book Bank project is also underway. We
have the books, we have the locations and through a partnership
with Ranch Hope, the students took on the project of building the bookshelves.
Once completed, volunteers distributed them to the 8
locations with the children's books for reading and
owning.
Vision for Health and Safety in
Salem County
Building a community care network that
supports health and safety in Salem County. This includes
supporting caregivers and helping to maximize the ability of the
elderly and persons with disabilities to live independently.
It also includes supporting prevention measures in health and safety
that provide education and direct services. This group
is working with the Sheriff's Department and Safe Kids in regard to
Car Seats for children and bicycle safety.
This group is also promoting Social Security
supplemental prescription plans and the Minority Health Initiative
that was developed in cooperation with the YMCA of Salem County.
Vision for Community Action
Building a community emergency response network that meets the
basic needs of families and individuals, who, due to personal crisis
or natural disaster, find themselves unable to meet their basic
needs. Building a community network that provides information
on services available in the county while tracking service usage and
service gaps. Promote volunteerism throughout the county.
This group is working on ways to build financially stable here in
Salem County. For example this is the first year that The United Way
Office here in Salem County also functioned as a VITA site for tax
preparation.
This group is also working on spreading the word
about 2-1-1 with the focus being that it is user friendly and there
is always a live person on the other end of the phone to give
answers to any questions you may have. Other programs include the
monthly commodity food distribution and the Holiday Assistance
Program.
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