We at United Way of King County are working to help keep families in their homes, food on their tables and their children excelling in schools. Many people throughout the county join us in that effort each year, and in addition to giving kudos to dedicated individuals and community organizations we grateful for the generous donations from our many sponsors.  

So, the next time you’re picking up groceries at Safeway, depositing a check at U.S. Bank or ordering a Cinnamon Dolce Latte at Starbucks, keep in mind that their donations to United Way help address homelessness, combat hunger, eradicate racial inequities and close achievement gaps in education.

We’d like to take time to recognize these and other sponsors for their gifts during our fiscal year, as well as the United Way programs that benefit from their giving.

Streets to Home is a program that works with people experiencing homelessness to set them on a path of upward mobility by quickly getting them into housing and connecting them with employment so they can afford to stay there. During the first three quarters of our fiscal year, Streets to Home ended homelessness for 450 people by connecting them with housing, and 426 of those people received employment which will help them sustain the housing. Our program data shows that 95% of households remain housed at least six months after they’ve been served by Streets to Home.

United Way thanks U.S. Bank for its donation to help connect people to housing and employment.

DoorDash, Safeway and United Way are working with the community to provide hunger relief to tens of thousands of our neighbors every week through our Fuel Your Future program. Here’s how it works: A box of essential groceries or bag of culturally appropriate food is prepared. A DoorDash driver picks up the food. The DoorDash driver delivers it to a King County household in need. This is a free service for the household and it eliminates access barriers during the pandemic.

Further, the DoorDash drivers get paid for their delivery, making it a win-win outcome. Our home delivery program remains the largest United Way-DoorDash partnership in the country. We are serving more than 6,000 families per week, and in the third quarter, United Way focused on expanding our reach with community college students and is now serving 1,650 King County community college students weekly.

United Way thanks the Safeway Foundation, Share our Strength, Kaiser Permanente and the Schultz Family Foundation (Starbucks) for helping keep food on the families’ tables.

Bridge to Finish : Community colleges are an affordable way for people to get a higher education, yet fewer than half of community college students earn a credential—a figure that has been exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our Bridge to Finish program helps students get the services they need to stay in school and complete their education.

Through the third quarter, Bridge to Finish connected 6,112 students to 41,482 financial interventions. Additionally, Additionally, 12 students were moved out of homelessness and into subsidized units at Shoreline Community College. Also, 84% of students who received at least one Bridge to Finish service during a given quarter completed a credential or persisted to the next quarter, a rate that is nearly 13 percentage points higher than all non-Bridge to Finish participants at the same institutions.

United Way thanks Nordstrom, Premera Blue Cross, Hughes Foundation, PACCAR and Symetra for their donations to help community college students thrive in school.

Thanks to these and all other sponsors for your donations. We could not do our work without you.