ESSEX COUNTY UNITED WAY TASK FORCE

Monday, January 30, 2023

 

 

Chairman Monty called this United Way Task Force to order at 8:30 am with the following in attendance; Jim Monty, Ike Tyler, Mark Wright, Krissy Leerkes and Mike Mascarenas (8:50). Shaun Gillilland, Noel Merrihew, Angie Allen and Jennifer Mascarenas were absent. Stephanie DeZalia and Steve McNally had been previously excused.

 

Also Present: Dina Garvey

 

MONTY: Good morning, we’ll start this Task Force meeting. I am going to come in next week and talk to Department Heads. I want to bring posters in, February a local supervisor is participating in kiss a cow contest.

 

LEERKES: So, with, how is Essex County employees compared to, like counterparts, like Clinton County and Franklin?

 

MONTY: You don’t even want to ask that question. It’s a great question, back, probably about 10 years ago, when John O’Neill was part of it. John, O’Neill, started spreading the rumor that John Bernardi was making $200,000.00 a year as United Way President, he was putting that out here to the employees, and of course, that spread like wildfire, thinking they were paying his salary.

 

LEERKES: Right

 

MONTY: When in fact John does make $114,000.00, but it’s $200,000.00.

 

LEERKES: Right, right

 

MONTY: And our administrative costs at United Way, here, are 14%. You know, the big deal about that was with the Wounded Warriors, if you remember?

 

LEERKES: Yup

 

MONTY: Theirs was 80 some perfect, of every dollar goes to their admin costs.

 

LEERKES: Right

 

MONTY: And the beauty with the United Way donation, you can pick one of the 36 partner agencies and 100% of your donation does to that partner agency with no admin costs.

 

LEERKES: Yup

 

MONTY: You can give to the United Way, but then that’s where 14% of your money would go toward admin costs.

 

LEERKES: Right and I think and I don’t know this to be a possibility, but you know, times are hard for everybody.

 

MONTY: Absolutely

 

LEERKES: Whether it’s the working class, our employees, I am sure are struggling, as well, I have a small department, but I hear mu staff.

 

MONTY: Yup

 

LEERKES: Has there ever been any talk of in addition to the possibility of the payroll deduction of doing, like maybe, every couple of months, like some type of fun fundraiser, like, okay, you’re kissing a cow of whatever you’re doing.

 

MONTY: Yup

 

LEERKES: I remember that Dave did, our Sheriff did that and I can’t remember what the fundraiser was for, when they put him jail for overnight.

 

MONTY: Yeah

 

LEERKES: I’m just thinking, we may not be able to get a really good percentage of county employees do a payroll deduction, but they’d rather see like, Supervisor Tyler, like have to clean the Public Safety Building a day.

 

MONTY: Shave his head.

 

LEERKES: Or shave his head or whatever dye his hair pink, but again, that’s probably way, I don’t know.

 

MONTY: No, no, that’s great, those are all great ideas. I was going to send those posters out, because there is a QR code on it that you can make donations to the United Way for the individuals involved in it.

 

LEERKES: Right

 

MONTY: No, these are all great ideas. We, last year, the number of people that donated went down, but the dollar amount went up. Which is a win/ win.

 

LEERKES: Yup

 

MONTY: You know, you would like to see more people.

 

LEERKES: Right

 

MONTY: For the 8th year in a row, I’ve challenged the Supervisors to donate, because I’m a firm believer that you lead by example. If we’re going to ask our employees to donate, we should be leading the charge and donating, as well.

 

LEERKES: Yup

 

MONTY: That hasn’t always gone as well as I would like.

 

LEERKES: Right

 

MONTY: But, again, that’s everybody’s individually choices.

 

LEERKES: Right, I just, in having conversations with not just my staff, but some other staff, like I said, they’re saying times are tough for themselves, groceries, food costs, whatever.

 

MONTY: Understood, fuel.

 

LEERKES: And I don’t want this to come off on the wrong way, but if they saw something, like you kissing a cow or putting you in jail for the night, I think that would be just some fun.

 

MONTY: I know Linda Beers, one year did a pizza party.

 

LEERKES: Yup, we did that.

 

MONTY: And one year, for depending on what the donation was, they gave a day off and stuff, which you know, I think isn’t a bad thing and stuff, because United Way, one of my goals when I got asked to join the Board was to bring a bigger presence to Essex County and because a lot of times everything was Clinton or Franklin County.

 

LEERKES: Right

 

MONTY: So, I tried to bring it so we were getting some and I think we have. I mean they stepped up big time when we had all that flooding, Schroon Lake, Crown Point. Ti. We helped a woman down there in Ti. We put her up for a month because her home was uninhabitable down there due to some, it wasn’t from the flood, itself, it was a broken water pipe. We’re constantly doing stuff like that. We’ve got the backpack programs that are coming, actually pride of Ti, applied for a, one of the mini grants that United Way has and it doesn’t compared to your $10 million, but they got $2,500.00.

We’ll adjourn, because I know you guys have EMS. Thank you, for showing up and sharing your thoughts, good thoughts and I’ll send that poster around, if people want to post it.

 

LEERKES: Are you going to put it in the mailboxes or are you going to just email it?

 

MONTY: I was going to email it to Department Heads and they can post it.

 

LEERKES: Okay

 

MONTY: Thank you.

 

 

AS THERE WAS NO FURTHER BUSINESS TO COME BEFORE THIS UNITED WAY, TASK FORCE ADJOURNED AT 8:50 AM.

 

 

Respectively Submitted,

 

 

Dina L. Garvey, Deputy Clerk

Board of Supervisors