August 2020 Directors Letter

Directors Letter
August 2020 – COVID update

Community Power. Do you feel it?  I sure do!

It is local farmers bringing us produce for our lunches. It is neighbors bringing groceries to
neighbors. It is a friend taking a friend to the doctor and sitting in their car waiting. It is a team of people making face masks for the seniors. And it is people giving generously every month to the Senior Center.

That’s community power! I am especially grateful for the 30 people who donate every single month without fail. These recurring gifts give us a foundation that we can count on. It provides the Center some stability in these
uncertain times. It is a powerful way to make even more of a difference so we can keep serving meals daily and providing virtual activities. So thank you to these monthly donors. I salute you for your faithfulness. If you’d like to join this faithful cadre, just visit our website at https://snovalleysenior.org/ and you can make a one-time gift there or click monthly. Any amount helps. We have monthly gifts from $5 per month to $500 per month!

We so appreciate our monthly givers that we invite you to dinner in January along with our biggest donors and new Lifetime members. So you not only get rewarded by the difference you make but also enjoy a great meal and a slide show of the impact you’ve made. We depend on our monthly donors now more than ever as our costs for lunches delivered and to-go are higher. Costs are higher because to-go containers cost us about $700 per month.

So how is the Senior Center doing financially? We’re doing alright. We’ve gotten some grants. (In June Safeway Foundation gave us $10,000!) We also got a PPP payroll protection loan to see us through which is forgiven and doesn’t have to be paid back if we keep all of our staff on board. IF we have a good virtual auction on Oct. 17th, (our goal is $50,000) I predict we should end the year a little in the black or with a very small deficit. That is due in no small part to our donors who have really come through in big ways and small.

Our success is also due to a great volunteer corp. A huge thank you to Delores Ulrich and her family who have made strawberry shortcake for 20+ years for us on July 4th! She was assisted by her children and great grandchildren, Bobby Hinzman, Diane Amos and Denise Crutchfield. Together they made us $2,000 net with shortcake to-go!

I’m also grateful to Daniel Encisco of Legado Paints who recently painted our main hall where we serve lunch. I can’t wait for you all to see how clean and light it looks in white and brown. You’ll see it someday when we re-open (a little in phase 3 and completely in phase 4).  Daniel also served as one of spaghetti chefs with Maryann Coward and Jill Butler. They made some killer spaghetti! It was so popular that we ran out before the reserved dinners did so they whipped up some more on the fly! They were amazing. Spaghetti also made us about $2,000 net in to-go meals!

So how can we not be doing well with volunteers, supporters and a community like this! Thank you for being part of this amazing, wonderful place that is making a difference every day.

As always if you have any questions, complaints or compliments, I’m here. You can reach me at Lisay@soundgenerations.org or 425-333-4152.