Nuway Tobacco
United Way 2025 Community Impact Report
How your CV stacks up
Upload your CV to see how well it fits this job role
?%
January 26, 2026
VIEW THE DIGITAL EDITION HERE
UNITED TO END POVERTY
This past year, United Way of Central and Northeastern Connecticut celebrated a Centennial milestone, launched a new strategic plan, opened its new downtown office and entered a strategic alliance with United Way of West Central Connecticut. President and CEO, Eric Harrison, shares more about the organization’s accomplishments and what’s next.
You started this year by launching a new strategic plan for United Way of Central and Northeastern Connecticut. Tell us more about what you’re working on?
Celebrating our Centennial milestone gave us a great opportunity to increase our impact while also reversing some of the revenue declines we and United Ways across the globe have seen for the last several years.
Our answer to that was to identify a signature platform, which is Onward860: United to End Poverty. Since arriving in Connecticut in 2022, I have done a lot of listening. I’ve met with our partners, and I held community conversations and interviewed our donors and corporate partners in an effort to truly understand community conditions and what resonates with people. What I’ve learned in those conversations is that there is a huge sense of town pride in Connecticut but also a strong desire to reduce the disparities that we see town by town. The fact that your life expectancy in the North End of Hartford is 10 years shorter than three miles down the road in West Hartford is unacceptable. So Onward860 is about uniting our region, to create opportunities for success regardless of your zip code. And, United to End Poverty is really about addressing the fact that 40 percent of people in our region live in extreme and working poverty, and we need to mobilize efforts to reduce that number.
What is different about this strategic plan?
What I’m really proud of is the fact that this plan really looks at every aspect of our organization from our community impact goals to the ways that we are creating operational efficiencies. We are also doing our work differently. We have named 40 strategic partners. These partners receive funding, but they also have committed to being a part of working groups that come together quarterly to co-design initiatives that will impact systems-level change. Through these working groups we also have opportunities to maximize efficiency in our strong nonprofit sector, bring our voices together to advocate for policies that affect the people we serve and our organizations, and most importantly, increase our impact. We have also established a Data Advisory Council which is working on identifying community-level shared outcomes for each working group, which is very exciting.
We have heard a lot about revenue declines impacting United Ways but also nonprofits in general. What are you seeing in your work?
Reasons to use Rodeo
Start with a chat, not a search bar
Grad scheme, placement, apprenticeship? Not sure what you want yet — that's fine. Your agent talks it through with you and turns "I have no idea" into a shortlist.
It searches the market for you
Every day your agent scans the market matching roles against what actually matters to you, not just keywords on a CV.
Only hits
No noise. No "maybe this fits." Just roles with a clear explanation of why they're right — and where to focus when applying.
For several years, United Ways have been experiencing declines in revenue in large part due to evolution and changes in workplace giving globally. As a result, revenue diversification has been a top priority for us, and we are beginning to see success in this area. We continue to work with our corporate partners on employee giving campaigns and we appreciate the generosity and the spirit that workplaces in our region give to the campaign. At the same time, we have increased our focus on grants and philanthropy outside of the workplace to allow us to continue to grow. Over the last three years, we have received four of the largest individual gifts in our organization’s history. We have also had opportunities to embark on public – private partnerships to mobilize resources for workforce development, child literacy and emergency response. While times are challenging, people continue to be extremely generous, and we are fortunate to live in a state that is innovative in thinking about how we can affect community conditions.
Things seem to be particularly challenging this year. We have seen headlines about heightened food insecurity and an increase in homelessness. How is United Way responding?
Being responsive to pressing community needs is a part of our DNA at United Way. For the third year in a row, we activated the United Way Rapid Response Fund to help keep people in stable housing throughout the winter months. The goal of this fund is shelter diversion, so we work with local municipalities to identify individuals and families who are at-risk of becoming homeless. Through a referral system, we provide direct financial assistance to people so that they can make rent, mortgage and utility payments while ensuring their basic needs were met.
This year for this first time, we were also pleased to partner with Representative Jaime Foster, Representative Jennifer Leeper and Connecticut United Ways on an Emergency Assistance Fund. Through this effort we were able to provide grocery store gift cards to people experiencing food insecurity statewide.
You entered into a strategic alliance with United Way of West Central Connecticut earlier this year. Tell us more about that?
We had a great opportunity to join forces with United Way of West Central Connecticut. The goal of this partnership was to increase impact and maximize operational efficiencies in the 860 region. We are proud to now serve 56 towns in central and northeastern Connecticut, representing one – third of the state.
Earlier this year, you sold your long-time building at 30 Laurel Street and recently moved downtown. What went into your decision to move?
30 Laurel was a great home for many years. After the pandemic, I think everyone took a look at their spaces with fresh eyes and for us, we really found that being a landlord and maintaining a building of that size was taking away from our primary mission. By selling the building, we have the opportunity to invest more time and resources back into our community at a time when that is really needed. The building at 30 Laurel Street will become housing, which is great for that neighborhood. We feel so fortunate that with the sale of our building we had the opportunity to truly “come home” and move into a space that is owned by one of our original founding companies, HSB. It is great to be a part of the downtown community.
Get help with your application
Your very own career expert that helps elevate your application to the next level.
What’s next for United Way?
There are so many great opportunities ahead and ways for people to get involved in 2026. We are very excited to launch a new initiative called 860Gives. On April 1, we will mobilize the philanthropic community in the 860 region to support nonprofits that are delivering critical services. Over 36 hours, people will have the opportunity to give to the causes they care about most, and nonprofits will have an opportunity to raise additional funds to support their programs, which we know are in very high demand. 860Gives is modeled after a very successful fundraiser managed by United Way of Rhode Island called 401Gives. There is nothing like it in our region, and we are excited to bring this opportunity to our communities this spring.
Looking back, our strategic alliance with West Central Connecticut was one of the highlights of this year and I am hopeful that we can take what we have learned and continue to increase our ability to be of service to others in the nonprofit community, with a focus on maximizing efficiency and scaling effective programs and initiatives for greater impact.
As always, we will keep monitoring the increased challenges we have been seeing with respect to financial hardship, food insecurity and housing stability, and we will continue to be responsive to emerging needs.
We have so many exciting opportunities ahead of us, including a full slate of spring fundraising events and volunteer opportunities that you don’t want to miss.
To stay up to date on everything we are doing and find ways to get involved, visit our website at unitedwayinc.org.
Eric Harrison
President and CEO
United Way of Central and Northeastern Connecticut
VIEW THE DIGITAL EDITION HERE
UNITED TO END POVERTY
This past year, United Way of Central and Northeastern Connecticut celebrated a Centennial milestone, launched a new strategic plan, opened its new downtown office and entered a strategic alliance with United Way of West Central Connecticut. President and CEO, Eric Harrison, shares more about the organization’s accomplishments and what’s next.
“It took my CV and asked me questions relevant to understanding what kind of jobs to suggest for me. Suggestions were almost perfect. Jobs were exactly what I’ve been looking for.”
Jessica, London
Skills
Location