Securing Their Place at the Table

Members broaden impact by working with, not for, immigrant communities

Published in Issue 2 – 2009 of the Alliance for Children & Families Magazine (view or print article PDF)

If we’re so good, why don’t they come to our agency?” It’s a seemingly simple question that, when asked by senior leaders at Alliance for Children and Families member Family Services of Montgomery County, Eagleville, Pa., led the organization into unexplored territory.

Since the mid 1960s, southeast Pennsylvania—like many other regions of the country—has been experiencing an influx of immigrants from India and Korea. Yet, requests for services from these new residents were nonexistent.

“It became clear that the agency was under-serving various minority populations,” Larry Fiebert, associate executive director, says. “I was puzzled by that.”

Larry Fiebert, right, is pictured with Haejung Yum during an outreach event for the Korean community in southeast Pennsylvania.

Family Services’ leaders set out to uncover answers. Instead, they discovered a vacuum created by a lack of disaggregated, broad-based research about Korean and Asian Indian cultures, their needs, and how to serve these populations.

The premise upon which Family Services’ exploration was based—“If we’re so good, why don’t they come to our agency?”—can be asked by Alliance members across the country in their distinct regional terms. At La Casa de Esperanza, Waukesha, Wis., “they” refers to a population of Latinos. In Portland, Ore., and Vancouver, Wash., Impact Northwest (Impact NW) has asked the same question about a growing Eastern European community.

For all three members, civic engagement—efforts that work with these communities rather than for these communities—has provided insight.

‘We Need to be at the Table’

Several years ago La Casa was moving forward with plans to create a charter school. In early 2007, however, the effort was halted when the school district—even though it had already approved the curriculum—decided not to approve funding for the school.

	La Casa de Esperanza looks to community volunteers for help with its voter registration efforts.

 “This is something that we believed our community deeply needed,” Sarah Hawks, director of advocacy and public policy, says. “I think we learned the importance of making sure our view is heard. We had parents involved throughout the charter school planning process, but if we had more parents involved in speaking with school board members and going to school board meetings, maybe the outcome would’ve been different.”

That setback, combined with the organization’s increasing involvement in promoting civic participation among its clients through voter registration and mobilization campaigns, provided La Casa with an opportunity to reassess how to best accomplish its mission.

“La Casa’s philosophy is that civic engagement and advocacy allow us to broaden our impact in the community,” Hawks says. “We need to be at the table.”

In 2007, La Casa institutionalized this philosophy with its Advocacy and Public Policy Initiative. With funding from the Alliance’s civic engagement program, La Casa’s project has been able to reach throughout the organization and the community to engage clients, staff, policy makers, and community stakeholders.

“La Casa is often seen as a key voice of the community, but we want to move beyond that,” Hawks says. “We’re happy to help in any way, but we also want the community we serve to come to the table with us because they have the authentic voices. They are the people impacted by policies.”

‘We Serve the Experts’

Guided by the attitude that listening and connecting are equally as important as providing services, Impact NW centers its work with Eastern European residents on the belief that the agency is not the expert.

Children paint Easter eggs during a cultural event hosted by Impact NW.

“We serve the experts,” Scott Shlaes, director of development, says. “The people we serve are the experts on their lives and understand what their barriers are. Our goal as an organization is to be the connector, not some hierarchical structure telling people how to live their lives.”

More than 10 years ago, communities in southwest Washington and northwest Oregon experienced an increase in immigrants and refugees from Eastern Europe. Impact NW convened an advisory group of individuals from these cultures to discuss how the organization could help. In response to the needs identified by the group, the agency applied for and, in 2003, received funding to solely provide anti-poverty and safety net services for the Slavic Community in Multnomah County, Ore., an area which includes the city of Portland.

Additionally, the advisory group identified needs beyond services. Residents asked for help organizing to promote community engagement, interaction, and activities. Funded by a grant from the Alliance’s civic engagement program, in the summer of 2008 Impact NW created an informal coalition to plan culturally-specific civic events and disseminate targeted health and human services information.

The ongoing events, which regularly draw nearly 200 adults and children, bring the community together and celebrate shared culture. Just as important, the events present a nonthreatening opportunity to provide families with information about and connections to human service providers.

“It’s community organizing on a casual level,” Shlaes says. “We’re providing services, community connections, and a sense of cohesion without the families really knowing there’s an official agenda.”

Past events have centered on awareness and prevention issues, including domestic violence and child abuse. Literature and information is set out for attendees to peruse at their leisure, and human service professionals are on hand to answer questions.

“We define civic engagement as taking collective actions to address issues of a public concern,” Renata Wilson, director of housing and safety net services at Impact NW, says. “That’s what we’re trying to do with the events, because this is how we can reach these people. It’s about finding ways to get the information out there and get the discussion started on topics that are not necessarily popular.”

Shlaes adds, “The essence of the event is relationship building. It shows people that we’re invested in their community, and it demonstrates how we’re not telling them what to do, but that we’re simply a resource to help them reach their goals.”

Defining the Unmet Needs

To explore why Korean and Asian Indian residents underutilized social and health resources in the community, in 2007 Family Services received a grant from the North Penn Community Health Foundation to conduct a needs assessment. Additional funding was secured from the North Penn United Way.

	A high school student, right, volunteered to translate Family Services’ needs assessment report into Korean. She’s pictured with her mother, left.

The project involved a comprehensive review of professional literature, as well as extensive individual interviews with more than 40 representatives of the Korean and Asian Indian communities, including religious leaders, business owners, and residents in the northern portion of Montgomery County, Pa.

Informants shared 14 significant problem areas and unmet needs experienced in their communities. Most often cited among the Korean population were concerns related to the elderly, language barriers, and mental health issues. In the Asian Indian community, issues of the elderly, mental health, and domestic violence concerns recurred most frequently.

The tangible result of the needs assessment project was a bound, 90-page report with 60 recommendations. Less tangible was the growing desire among residents involved in the project, as well as leaders at Family Services, to continue the project in a new form.

With funding from the Alliance’s civic engagement program, Family Services committed to promoting the needs assessment through Asian Indian and Korean “IDEAS”—involvement, dissemination, engagement, action, and services.

Three initial community forums were convened: first a gathering of nearly 35 members of the Asian Indian community, second a meeting of about 50 Korean residents, and third an event for around 75 health and human services professionals.

“When I presented the findings of the needs report to the Asian Indian and Korean communities, this opened up a very interesting conversation among people who would not ordinarily be talking about these kinds of issues,” Fiebert says. “Many of the issues discussed in the report are stigma- or shame-related in these two cultures.”

What unfolded after each conversation were plans for further action, Fiebert says. In the Korean community, a group of residents stepped forward to steer a project aimed at lifting up the voices of residents in order to strengthen the health and well-being of their community. To do so, the group has held additional community conversations and engaged with leaders from school districts and health and human service organizations.

A similar effort has developed from the initial meeting with Asian Indian residents.

Family Services, and Fiebert specifically, still plays a supportive role in helping move both groups closer to their end goals, but ultimately each project is owned by its committee and community residents.

“It’s happening somewhat differently than I had originally imagined, but if you believe that these communities should have their own voice, then you have to surrender the idea that ‘I know better because this is my field,’” Fiebert says.

Nonprofits as the First Line of Defense

Two years after senior leaders began asking themselves why Family Services is underutilized by Korean and Asian Indian residents, the organization has witnessed a snowballing effect—and the end is not in sight.

Favorable responses to the project have come from throughout Pennsylvania, but also from as far away as California. The needs assessment produced in the first phase of the project has been used by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a major health care issues organization in the United States, in its weekly health disparities report. It has also been picked up by other websites and organizations that focus on Asian, Asian Indian, and Korean cultures.

“People call and say, ‘We heard that you’re an expert in this area,’” Fiebert says. Although he’s quick to distance himself from the title of expert, Fiebert acknowledges that for people interested in this specialized issue there are few resources to turn to, which makes it easy for them to happen upon the work of Family Services.

As a result of Family Services’ efforts to elevate the voices of these underserved populations, Fiebert says the organization has been placed in an important community role and alongside other players the agency previously had little interaction with. “It’s helping to position us as an important partner that should be at the table with various governmental agencies and other funders.”

Similarly, La Casa de Esperanza is realizing the fruits of its efforts. According to Hawks, the organization is beginning to be viewed as a trusted resource for information on issues impacting Latino and low-income families.

“Nonprofits are the first line of defense,” she says. “We’re on the ground. We hear what the people are saying every single day: what their troubles are, what’s holding them back, or what they need to move forward. We have to share that information.”

Wilson, of Impact NW, adds, “Those we serve many times don’t have a voice of their own. It’s important to get people involved. It’s not enough just to serve people. There also needs to be some system change, and that doesn’t happen without civic engagement or advocacy.”

For more information about the members in this article go to their websites: Impact Northwest, La Casa de Esperanza, and Family Services of Montgomery County. Family Services' full needs assessment report can be accessed as a PDF.