Fund targets women’s needs

Laura Squier of CareNet spoke about “hope” at the Women Helping Women brunch held Saturday, May 6. CareNet was a recipient of a $2,500 grant award from the charitable group focused on women’s needs in the Endless Mountains. STAFF PHOTO/STACI WILSON

Women Helping Women celebrated its five year anniversary by honoring its 2017 grant recipients at an event held Saturday, May 6 at the Community Foundation of the Endless Mountains in Montrose.
Both CareNet and the Women’s Resource Center received $2,500 from the charitable fund.
Women Helping Women was established as a collective philanthropic fund dedicated to addressing the current needs of women in the Endless Mountains.
Ellen Jackson, a member of the WHW leadership committee, said the group has supporting women in the community with real needs. “We are dedicated to overcoming obstacles.”
In five years, through donations and pledges the fund has increased its annual awards from $1,400 in 2012 to $5,000 this year. Those funds have stayed within the community.
Pamela Staats, part of the leadership committee, said CareNet’s Laura Squier spoke of providing “hope” in the award interview process.
Squier said the grant would be used to purchase tablets for the centers in Montrose and Tunkhannock, with a program that can be used to help clients at the crisis pregnancy center.
She spoke a teen that came to CareNet in need of a pregnancy test. “Waves of anxiety and fear rolled over her,” she said. The teen needed a place to go to talk about issues she was facing.
CareNet also provides parenting help with life skills, budgeting and decision making classes where new moms are able to earn “cash” to purchase items at their boutique.
Squier said in her work with women she has witnessed “good, healthy benefits and families strengthened.”
Tiffany Benedict of the Women’s Resource Center Susquehanna County Program Manager, spoke of “justice” and “empowerment.”
WRC helps women navigate thought the legal system and can act as an advocate; as well as accompany someone for medical care.
“Sometimes justice has more to do with a person’s own inner peace,” Benedict said.
She also said she is not a fan of the word, “victim.”
“I would call us survivors,” she said.
WRC would like to use the award to not only help domestic violence survivors, but also work toward better educating the community and is working with the Child Advocacy Center in the “Stop Child Abuse Now” initiative.
“As a community, our job is to work together to identify needs,” she said, including looking at funding for an emergency shelter.
Grants from the Women Helping Women fund are awarded from a percentage of the interest, with the principal of the fund not utilized, as a way to continue the fund awards in perpetuity.
For more information about Women Helping Women, or to donate, visit: www.community-foundation.org.

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