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EVENT UPDATE: The scheduled Pottstown Community Celebration of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. program brought to you by Communities of Faith in Pottstown will be held as planned on Sunday, January 19 for anyone able to attend safely. It will also be live-streamed here beginning at 4 p.m.: https://events.locallive.tv/events/167017
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Please mark your calendar for January 19, 2025 at 4:00 PM for the 18th Annual Pottstown Community Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr Celebration. The Hill School will host the Celebration in the Center for The Arts located 766 Beech Street, Pottstown. Our guest speaker will be Dr. Matthew Washington, Author – The Jim Crow of the North: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Pottstown, Pennsylvania.
Proceeds to benefit the Pottstown Cluster.
This event is sponsored by the Pottstown Communities of Faith.
We have an exciting announcement! To help us finish the year without a deficit, we have received incredible support from a generous local donor who has committed to matching all donations up to $50,000 by year-end. This support comes at a time when rising demand for our services, coupled with a decrease in funding, has presented us with extraordinary challenges. We are facing significant hurdles to avoid a deficit by the end of 2024.
If you have already given, we truly appreciate it. If you’ve been contemplating making a contribution, NOW is a crucial time when your support will make a difference and our impact will be doubled.
Make your gift here!
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Our organization is dedicated to providing food security and housing stability in the Pottstown area. We accomplish this through a food pantry, satellite pantry locations, Community Meals, food redistribution, and housing services to prevent eviction and homelessness among older adults. However, we cannot achieve this without your support!
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In celebration of GivingTuesday, we invite you to join our mission by making an end-of-year contribution to help ensure food security and housing stability in the Pottstown area. You can make an end-of-year gift here to help us fulfill our mission. We not only need your support but also your help in spreading the word. Please share with your friends and family why you believe in our work and encourage them to support us as well! |
Interested in learning more about our work and impact? Check out our annual video and a recent housing success story.
Read the full story here.
This past year has been filled with service and challenges. We celebrate our ability to help many people, including a 77-year-old veteran whose eviction we prevented with your support. Our food pantry has seen a rise in demand, serving over 300 more individuals in October than in September, while grant funding has decreased. We faced significant cuts in housing funding, leading to reduced staff and increased financial strain on our food services. Despite these challenges, our dedicated volunteers and staff keep operations running. We ask for your end-of-year contributions to help us continue our mission. We welcome inquiries and visits, and we are here to support those facing food insecurity or housing instability.
READ MORE HERE
Giving and Gratitude Q & A: Highlighting Pottstown Cluster with Executive Director Jacqui Good
This November, our Giving and Gratitude segment shines a light on Pottstown Cluster, one of our partner organizations that truly embodies the spirit of giving. We sat down with Jacqui Good from Pottstown Cluster to learn more about their mission and the vital role of community support.
Q. What does “giving” mean to Pottstown Cluster, and how does it shape your mission and daily work?
A. Giving to Pottstown Cluster means partnering with donors and volunteers to serve our community. Our mission is to help meet basic needs like food security and housing stability. We serve as stewards of resources in order to help as many people as possible. In 2023, we served more than 17,000 people from the food pantry alone. We benefit from a wide variety of resources to meet those needs that includes funding and gifts-in-kind, from individuals, organizations, and funders.
Q. What roles does community support play in your organization’s ability to provide for those in need?
A. Community support is imperative to our work. We draw-on support from large nonprofits like Philabundance and Share, foundations, individual donors, other community groups, and volunteers. The absence of any of these sources could result in reduced services. It takes support from all of these sources to meet the needs of those depending on us.
Q. How do you express gratitude to the volunteers and donors who make your work possible?
A. We show our appreciation to donors through various forms of communication, including acknowledgment letters, handwritten notes, phone calls, and email messages. We also keep them informed and engaged through annual appeal letters with program updates, social media posts, participation in community groups, and speaking engagements.
Q. What are some ways people can give back to Pottstown Cluster during the holiday season, even if they aren’t able to make a financial decision?
A. Even if individuals and organizations are not able to make a financial donation, it helps our work to send people to our website and talk about our work.
Q. How has the generosity of the community helped shape your organization’s future plans or upcoming initiatives?
A. In nearly every case when we have reached-out on social media and the website and asked for donations, there has been a response, and we are grateful.
Thank you, Pottstown Cluster, for demonstrating the true spirit of giving and gratitude through this Q&A.
M
eet Mr. Smith, whose story highlights the risk of homelessness for older adults on fixed incomes during life crises or financial setbacks.
Mr. Smith, a 77-year-old veteran living alone in Pottstown, faced a challenging situation when his personal information was compromised, leading to the suspension of his monthly SSI benefits of less than $1,000. This financial strain made it difficult for him to keep up with his rent, prompting his landlord to initiate eviction proceedings in September. In desperation, Mr. Smith reached out to the Pottstown Cluster of Religious Communities for assistance. Thanks to funding secured for our older adult housing support program, we were able to intervene and prevent his eviction by covering his back rent, late fees, court costs, and his November rent. This assistance provided Mr. Smith with the breathing space he required to regain his financial footing and return to a state of stability, enabling him to pay his rent independently. Overwhelmed with gratitude, Mr. Smith expressed his heartfelt thanks, while we felt a deep sense of fulfillment in being able to provide a housing helping hand up to such a deserving person.
Mr. Smith’s story illustrates the vulnerability of older adults living on fixed incomes to homelessness, particularly when faced with a life crisis or financial setback. Mr. Smith is sadly just one among many. An alarming trend is the increasing number of older adults who are at-risk of becoming homeless. We’ve witnessed many individuals over the age of 80 experiencing rent hikes from $500 to more than $1,000. With the average monthly Social Security income sitting at $943, and the typical rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Montgomery County reaching $1,200. The situation is alarming. Additionally, the average wait time for senior housing is two years, which clearly indicates a looming crisis. To address this issue, the Pottstown Cluster has developed a program aimed at helping low-income older adults remain or transition into safe, affordable housing,
To make a contribution towards addressing our mission’s most pressing needs, visit pottstowncluster.org/donate
Download the full release here
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
The Pottstown Cluster of Religious Communities launches Pottstown Backpack Week, providing free backpacks and school supplies to students in preparation for the 2024 school year
POTTSTOWN, PA, July 31, 2024 – The Pottstown Cluster of Religious Communities has initiated Pottstown Backpack Week, providing 500 free backpacks and school supplies to students in preparation for the upcoming academic year. The event is set to start the week of August 5, 2024, with 500 backpacks filled with school supply essentials to be distributed to students at five different community locations around Pottstown.
“Families accessing our food and housing services, whether that be through our community food pantry, Community Meal program, or housing support services, come from a variety of crises. For almost everyone, purchasing school supplies every year is very challenging. The purpose of Pottstown Backpack Week is to unite the community to alleviate financial burdens for under-resourced families and collectively empower Pottstown area students to achieve academic success,” said Jacqui Good, Pottstown Cluster’s Executive Director. “We are thrilled to be able to collaborate with other nonprofits to serve more people in Pottstown and make these resources more accessible to our neighbors.”
Pottstown Backpack Week is being brought to the Pottstown community by the Pottstown Cluster of Religious Communities through a partnership with Cradles to Crayons. The distribution dates and locations are Monday, 8/5 at Bethel Community Church of Pottstown; Tuesday, 8/6 at The Ricketts Center; Wednesday, 8/7 at the Pottstown Cluster; Thursday, 8/8 at the YMCA/724 N. Adams; and Friday, 8/9 at Community Health and Dental/Coventry Mall. The current schedule can be found at Pottstowncluster.org/Pottstownbackpackweek and facebook.com/pcrcoutreach.
About the Pottstown Cluster of Religious Communities: The Pottstown Cluster of Religious Communities was founded in 1967 by a coalition of churches wanting to address hunger and now operates as an independent secular nonprofit. Today, the Pottstown Cluster provides food security, housing stability, and supportive services to address basic needs and improve the overall stability of persons within and beyond the greater Pottstown area. In 2023, the Pottstown Cluster served 7,045 households from their food pantry, provided food to Community Meal locations which served 12,258 individuals, and reviewed 4,010 requests for help to prevent eviction. The housing team has worked with over 400 landlords to establish stable tenants, making the Pottstown Cluster an important link in the long-term success of affordable housing property owners. The Pottstown Cluster is the only food redistribution organization (RDO) in Montgomery County, distributing more than 570,000 pounds of food to more than 2,800 households annually. For more information, visit pottstowncluster.org. For more information or to give now, call 610.970.5995, or visit pottstowncluster.org.
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The Flyer (download here)
Pottstown Backpack Week Schedule:
Bookbags are available while supplies last.
Monday, 8/5 at Bethel Community Church of Pottstown – 12:30 p.m. until supplies last.
Tuesday, 8/6 at The Ricketts Center from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Wednesday, 8/7 at the Pottstown Cluster’s Outreach Center at 57 N. Franklin Street from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Thursday, 8/8 at the YMCA/724 N. Adams Street location from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m.
Friday, 8/9 at Community Health and Dental Office at the Coventry Mall at 351 W. Schuylkill Rd., Pottstown from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. (During the CHDC Community Health Fair)
With Your Help, We Can!
We are immensely grateful to share that we have reached nearly half our $100,000 fundraising goal, thanks to the support from the generous and committed people who have joined us in our mission with a gift to improve the lives of unhoused and vulnerable seniors in our community. Each donor, past and future, is a housing hero whose support is crucial for the success of our efforts and work.
Join us in making a significant impact in the lives of homeless and vulnerable seniors, ensuring they are housed so they can age securely and respectfully.
On May 7, 2024, we took part in a Day of Advocacy at the state Capitol, organized by the Collaborative Advocacy Network (CAN), a key part of the Bucks-Mont Collaborative Our aim was to shed light on two significant community concerns: affordable housing and behavioral health access policies. Together, we advocated for affordable housing and accessible behavioral healthcare policies. Check out the video by Family Promise Montco PA to see more!
