Officially incorporated 45 year ago, Helping Hands Hawaii’s roots on Oahu reach back to World War II.
“Our history began with volunteers helping in the community in some way, shape or form after Pearl Harbor was attacked. These volunteers started the Volunteer Placement Bureau in 1941, dispatching all over the island,” helping in schools, hospitals and elsewhere, said Susan Furuta, the nonprofit’s vice president and chief operating officer.
In subsequent decades, various efforts ranged from the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program in the ’70s, to programs providing services in mental health in the late ’90s. Furuta, who joined Helping Hands Hawaii in 2001, said the lineup of services is continuing to evolve.
“Our core areas of work focus on poverty, hunger, housing stability, language access and mental illness. What we do within those core areas has changed over the years based on community need, community collaboration with other organizations, gaps in services, funding shifts, and our own assessment of what we do well in … and if it’s sustainable.”
Helping Hands partners with the Honolulu Star-Advertiser and First Hawaiian Bank to run the annual Good Neighbor Fund campaign to help people grappling with challenges during the holiday season. The fund supports the Adopt A Family program, through which donors provide participants with Christmas gifts.
Born and raised in historic Ewa plantation’s close-knit community, built around manufacturing sugar, Furuta became a community service volunteer there at a young age. “Everybody knew everybody. It was neighbors helping out neighbors,” she said.
On a statewide scale, Helping Hands Hawaii’s mission echoes that sense of concern and support. “Each year we help connect our neighbors with neighbors in need, and together we help over 30,000 people with an array of services that empower them to become self-sufficient,” Furuta said, adding, “How wonderful is that?”
Question: How did this holiday season’s Adopt A Family program go?
Answer: Very well. We ended up with 767 families. About 75 percent were adopted, one-to-one, by an individual, family or business in the community. The remaining 25 percent were adopted through general donations made directly to our community wishing trees, other holiday events and the Good Neighbor Fund.
We successfully had all families adopted, thanks to the strong support from our community, our partner agencies, and our staff and volunteers, who worked super hard to meet the program’s deadlines and help provide inspiration to the families.
Toys — most frequently requested items included LOL dolls and Paw Patrol — and basic personal items like clothing and shoes were at the top of gift requests, but we also saw a high need for kitchen items. … We have seen tears of joy and thankfulness, and heard comments about having a moment of feeling “normal” and about feeling hope for 2019.
Q: What’s the status of the Good Neighbor Fund, compared to previous years?
A: Unfortunately, we’re behind where we were at last year by approximately $20,000. There has been a slight slowdown. … We have a few more weeks of donations, even beyond the end of the calendar year, to really assess how we did as compared to previous years.
Any downturn is likely due to the challenging economic environment for many donors as well as possibly a tie to the changes in the tax law (federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017), including an increase in the standard deduction. Nonprofits as a whole are worried about that in terms of the impact, in particular, on individual giving.
Q: The Good Neighbor Fund is administered year-round?
A: Yes. It’s used when other funds aren’t available through our Emergency Assistance Program to provide financial assistance to households experiencing a crisis or emergency that has put their housing at risk, or to those that are homeless and working to get back into housing.
The primary things we can provide for include rent, rental deposits and assistance with utility deposits and past-due utilities to avoid disconnection. Assistance is paired with a mandatory financial literacy workshop that helps households to identify how they got into the emergency situation — in terms of things like no savings — and how they can work to become more financially stable. Some of the most common emergency or crisis situations include: long-term illness or high-cost medical emergency, death in the family of an income earner, and job loss or job downsizing.
Q: Until last year, an average of 500 families participated in the annual Adopt A Family program. In 2017, that number jumped to 800. Why do you think the count has increased?
A: A few years ago we hired a “communications and development specialist” who really helped us improve the way we communicate with partner agencies and everyone in the community about what services we provide. The increase … may be due to increased awareness, and that families continue to struggle financially with the ever-increasing cost of living in Hawaii.
Q: As you monitor public policy and government budgets affecting your programs, do you see or anticipate changes on the horizon?
A: … Of particular focus in the coming year, as it ties to our current program areas and strategies, is SNAP (federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) changes and challenges around eligibility and requirements for low-income or homeless households. The majority of people receiving SNAP are the elderly and children.
Q: How is Helping Hands Hawaii funded?
A: Our operating budget hovers around $4 million. Approximately 50 percent is government; 35 percent, fee for service; and 15 percent, private donations, grants and corporate contributions. …
Q: Helping Hands Hawaii is aiming for what sorts of program tweaks or improvements this year?
A: … When we look at plans for the future, we always assess (1) Is there a community need?; (2) Do we have or can we build the capacity to do it, and do it well?; and (3) Is it sustainable (programmatically and financially)?
With that in mind, some early thoughts include: Expanding the reach of our Bilingual Access line beyond the majority of work being in health care while at the same time helping evolve the way that language access is handled in health care settings to benefit the people who need it.
Also: Improving on how we provide case management (social work) services to adults with mental illness; and looking at process efficiencies within our Community Clearinghouse program (collection and distribution of basic necessities, such as food, clothing and furniture) to better serve the community, including other providers whose clients access our Clearinghouse for items and support.
In addition: Working with the state and other homeless services providers to continue moving the needle on homelessness. In particular, being a part of the movement toward Medicaid-reimburseable housing search and support services as essential to the health and well-being of people; and continuing to assess existing programs and services to determine future viability, and what is having the impact we want and what isn’t.
We are not afraid of sometimes having to make hard decisions when programs are not having the impact we want. … There is always room for improvement, and sometimes others can do it better. Part of our role and the reputation we hope we have built in the community, is of being a good community partner, a positive contributor to community conversations about the many complex challenges we face as a state, and to operate with humility and aloha.
Q: How large is your staff and volunteer base?
A: We have 85 employees and work with over 38 regular volunteers.
Throughout the year we schedule over 250 one-time engagement volunteers, mainly through groups who come out for specific events. For example with School Tools (a donated student school supplies program), this year we had over 50 to 60 volunteers.
Volunteers are needed year-round in every program and department, including in the office and help in maintenance and facilities. We regularly accommodate flexible schedules. For more information about volunteer work, go to www.helpinghandshawaii.org, or call 440-3812.
