Pub 1 2021 Issue 1

Women Elevated 10 The discussion about adopting Women Help- ing Women as a League-owned project began in the fall of 1996. It was considered by the Community Research & Project Development Committee led by Janet Underwood along with committee members Cynthia Connor, Carrie Turner, and myself. The 1996-97 League year was a tough one. The League had committed to hosting the 1999 U.S. Figure Skating Championships at what was then known as the Delta Center in February 1999. Even two years out, it demand- ed a lot of volunteers and committee work. The overall sentiment of members was that our plates were full and we shouldn’t take on any new projects, much less one that was League-owned. However, our committee was undeterred and wanted to propose Women Helping Women to the membership. Through our community research, we had discovered three key things to make our case. 1. The community need was real. When a former community-owned project went away, it created a significant gap in the Salt Lake Valley. We met with several agencies working with women who didn’t have any resources to help clothe clients attempting to reenter the workforce and regain self-sufficiency. 2. The social environment was under pressure. In 1996, the U.S. Congress had passed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Restoration Act. This bipartisan welfare reform program created timelines by which welfare recip- ients needed to return to work along with a five-year lifetime cap on receiving ben- efits. This created significant pressure on agencies and other nonprofits work- ing with families to meet these deadlines. These agencies were clamoring for all the support they could get, including work-appropriate clothing to assist in giving clients a professional demeanor when interviewing for jobs. 3. There was a specific gap in the work-appropriate clothing donation system that we believed we could fill. The greatest need for providing cloth- ing was warehousing and distribution. The community-led project ended when a local warehouse donor sold the space to another business that made different choices about using the property. And while people are generous with do- nating used clothing, these donations were more than the organizations’ staff could handle. In the old JLSLC’s office, we had a little space that we believed could help fill the gap and contribute to the larger need. The League had recently focused volunteer efforts on women and children specifically, so the Community Research & Project Development Committee put together a proposal: • We would only focus on women’s clothing. • We would stick to things that were work-appropriate, which at the time, was much more formal than it is today. • We acknowledged that we weren’t in a position to evaluate which clients were in need, so we would work with agencies and nonprofits who were providing social services and have them refer clients to us. This also positioned us as collabora- tive partners versus “competitors” to the other organizations, making more sense for our community. • Finally, we would start slowly with a small committee to get ourselves organized. The League fulfilled its commitment to the U.S. Figure Skating Championships and CREATING A LASTING LEGACY WITH WOMEN HELPING WOMEN Janet Frasier, WHW Director 1996-97 SUSTAINING MEMBERS