United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County to adopt new funding model next year

Feb 27, 2025 10:03 pm

UnitedWay2024Campaign.02242025 — United Way of Greater Milwaukee and Waukesha County last year announced its goal to raise $57.5 million through its 2024 community campaign. Submitted photo.

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Beginning in July of 2026, United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County will only provide grants to organizations aligned with its key initiatives. The update to its funding model is designed to provide deeper and more meaningful funding to a smaller group of nonprofits to potentially accelerate the organization’s achievement of its initiative goals,

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Beginning in July of 2026, United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County will only provide grants to organizations aligned with its key initiatives. The update to its funding model is designed to provide deeper and more meaningful funding to a smaller group of nonprofits to potentially accelerate the organization’s achievement of its initiative goals, said Amy Lindner, president and chief executive officer of United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County. This year, those key initiatives are:

Reducing barriers to employment and advancement: 15,000 people will overcome key employment barriers and be ready to start stable careers by 2029.
Safe and stable homes: end family homelessness across United Way’s four-county footprint by 2025.
Techquity: Provide 50,000 computers to people who need them by 2027.
Teen mental wellness: Empowering Minds schools will elevate the mental wellness of 21,000 high school students by 2030.

The organization has historically provided funding to organizations outside of its key initiatives. Next year, all organizations seeking funding must participate in a competitive application process. Donors will still have the option to designate a United Way gift to a nonprofit of their choice. “In a large regard, we’ve been funding the same organizations, give or take, without application in perpetuity,” Lindner said. “We’ve been funding that work because it’s good work, because we believe in it, because they’re good organizations.” Because United Way’s funding has been stretched across so many areas and organizations, it can be challenging to measure what difference was made in the community because of United Way’s work, Lindner said. “By narrowing significantly the number of issues that we’re funding so we can go so much deeper, we can hold ourselves accountable to, we can talk to donors about really what can change in our community when people join in and become part of giving at United Way,” Lindner said. About 90% of the organizations funded by United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County are aligned with their key initiatives, Lindner said. On Feb. 10, United Way started reaching out to the organizations that have traditionally received funding who may be affected. This gives the organizations about 16 months to plan for the funding model change, Lindner said. United Way also plans to provide one-time transition grants to help these organizations adjust to the possible loss of funding. For 70% of the organizations that United Way funds, United Way’s investment was under 2% of the organizations’ total revenue, Lindner said. For the next 20% of organizations, United Way’s investment was under 5% of their revenue. The new application process will have at least two stages. The first step will be for nonprofits to submit a letter of intent outlining the work they hope United Way would fund, Lindner said. Based on the letters of intent, United Way will issue invitations for nonprofits to submit a more involved application. United Way may also ask for an interview. United Way plans to incorporate training sessions before the application deadline to ensure that nonprofits fully understand the process, Lindner said. “Our hope is at the end of this, not only do we have the best possible nonprofits who can help us make impact, which of course is the goal, but that those nonprofits are a nice cross section of: where geographically are they located, what corner of the communities do they concentrate their services in, are they big, are they small, are they women-led — all of the factors that would tell us we’ve done a good job in considering equity in addition to effectiveness,” Lindner said.

United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County to adopt new funding model next year

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