Our House, Families First Recognized by Bank of America for Impact in Helping Homeless Children, Families

The Bank of America Charitable Foundation has named Our House and Families First as Neighborhood Builders. The nonprofits are being recognized for their work supporting homeless children and addressing challenges families face in metro Atlanta.

Currently marking its 10th anniversary, Neighborhood Builders is a strategic investment in communities that combines $200,000 in flexible funding with leadership training for high-performing nonprofits and their executives.

“Over the last decade, we’ve heard from past recipients that the combination of unrestricted funding and leadership training has fundamentally changed their organizations and helped them stay competitive in an ever-changing funding environment,” said Geri Thomas, Georgia market president, Bank of America. “Our House and Families First have already done so much for families in Atlanta. This investment will empower them to build leadership capacity and expand to meet the evolving needs in our community.”

Our House in Decatur is a 26-year-old organization that breaks the chains of homelessness by providing quality early childhood education and comprehensive support services for families who are experiencing homelessness. Earlier this year, Our House and Genesis Shelter completed a merger of the organizations. This innovative and groundbreaking effort creates a Center of Excellence for homeless babies, children and families throughout metro Atlanta.

Families First in Atlanta has been providing services in metro Atlanta for more than 120 years. Its services, including adoption and foster care services, help give every child in Georgia a chance for a permanent home and hopeful future. The organization also provides services that help working parents and those facing homelessness to achieve self-sufficiency. Supportive counseling and courses for individuals, families and children help create healthy families and relationships.

“Our House is honored and excited to be a Neighborhood Builders grant recipient,” said Tyese Lawyer, executive director. “This wonderful grant and leadership training opportunity comes at a crucial and transformative time for us as we complete a merger with Genesis Shelter. The unrestricted operating grant will assist Our House as we build a center of excellence for homeless children and their families.”

“As a nonprofit providing social services, it’s difficult to invest in measurement and evaluation efforts, but these are necessary to demonstrate return on investment,” said Kim Anderson, CEO of Families First. “The Neighborhood Builders grant will help us better quantify our impact in the lives of those we serve as well as the community as a whole. By improving the way we collect and manage our data, we will be able to analyze our results more efficiently and present our impact more effectively. This will allow us to identify what is working, continuously innovate and better communicate our success to clients, partners and other stakeholders.”

Neighborhood Builders is the largest investment in nonprofit leadership development and organizational longevity. Through the program, Bank of America has invested $160 million in 800 nonprofit organizations across the nation and provided training to 1,600 nonprofit leaders. Recent past Neighborhood Builders grants have recognized North Fulton Community Charities, CHRIS Kids, Inc., Atlanta Technical College Foundation, Covenant House and Open Hand.

Leaders of past Neighborhood Builders directors speak to the importance of the grant and the leadership training:

“We continue to reap the benefits of the Neighborhood Builders Program,” said Kathy Colbenson, CEO of CHRIS Kids, a 2008 Neighborhood Builder. “We stay in touch with our small groups and our emerging leader continues to grow professionally from the network. The leadership development component of the program shaped for us a very specific way of thinking and approaching our ‘business’ – that’s what has positively impacted CHRIS Kids. The entire process underscored the importance of taking the time for leadership development, making us a much more intentional organization.”

According to Barbara Duffy, executive director of North Fulton Community Charities, a 2013 grant recipient: “The program broadened our entire horizon. It connected us with other nonprofits. Being in a suburb, it can be like an island. The leadership training was invaluable and we brought it back and implemented it with our own staff.”

Organizations selected as Neighborhood Builders are recognized for their significant impact in addressing needs related to community development, basic human services or workforce development and education. The flexible funding allows nonprofits to build capacity. At the same time, leaders of the organizations learn about issues core to nonprofit sustainability through the Neighborhood Builders leadership training.