Please Help Our Community

By Addie Nardi
Director of Resource Development

I used to be a pretty good saleswoman. It all started innocently enough. I was right out of college and had been promoted from secretary to Group Events Manager for the Frederick Keys, which meant I was responsible for selling group tickets and catered events. With no experience and a touch of ADD that doesn’t allow me to do ‘bored’ very well, I opened the phone book and just started calling people.

Then the money came in the form of commission, and then my competitiveness kicked in and I wanted to be, no HAD to be, the number one salesperson. So I set about working my way up the corporate chain.

And then I realized that it just wasn’t enough.

So I took my sales and marketing skills and I left the wild, wonderful world of sports and entertainment and found myself right smack dab in the middle of a fundraising campaign in the middle of a recession.

What was I thinking?

I’m proud of the dollars that we’ve raised to invest in the community since I have been with United Way. I’m proud of the work that we have done to improve lives in Washington County. I’ve NEVER worked as hard for dollars to come in as I have since I came to United Way. But I think that makes me appreciate the dollars and the donors even more.

But the flip side of that is that it’s hard to not raise the money we need. My first two campaigns here fell short. That not only hurt my ego (and believe me, it did), but it meant that one less person in our community that was accessing the help that they needed to get back on their feet. That’s one less child that was being helped. That’s one less uninsured person who was getting the health care they need. It’s one less senior citizen getting the nutrition they need. And that was a far worse realization than just appeasing my ego.

So our campaign is coming to a close for this year. And you, Washington County, have done a phenomenal job. I have several companies whose employees were able to increase their giving by more than $20,000! That’s a nice problem to have, isn’t it?

But the reality is, we’re not there yet, and we’re not done. We have just over a month to reach our campaign goal.

This is my plea to you to consider investing in our community through this year’s campaign if you haven’t already. It is super easy to donate to United Way. You can call me (I’m really very nice and if you’d like, I’ll tell you a joke) at 301-739-8200 Ext. 12. You can email me at anardi@unitedwaywashcounty.org or you can donate through our website at www.unitedwaywashcounty.org.

Your community (and my ego) will thank you.