Jersey Cares Inc.

JERSEY CARES WORKS WITH HUNDREDS OF NONPROFITS TO HELP THEM ANALYZE THE POTENTIAL FOR VOLUNTEERS TO HELP ACCOMPLISH THEIR GOALS. WE THEN RECRUIT VOLUNTEERS TO ACCOMPLISH THOSE GOALS THROUGH PROJECTS THAT RECUR AT EACH LOCATION ON A REGULAR BASIS AS WELL AS ONE-TIME EVENTS. IN THE LAST YEAR,JERSEY CARES CONTRIBUTED MORE THAN 2.3 MILLION TO NEW JERSEY'S COMMUNITIES IN VOLUNTEER TIME, PROJECT SUPPLIES, COATS, CHILDREN'S GIFTS, COLLECTION DRIVE DONATIONS AND OTHER QUANTIFIABLE IMPACT.

Jersey Cares envisions a New Jersey in which everyone is motivated and empowered to make a positive difference in the communities in which they live and work.

Goal One: Increase our impact by identifying and partnering with more community-based non-profit organizations that are working to address the most urgent needs facing communities across the state.

Goal Two: Reduce our reliance on a limited number of large corporate sponsors, by increasing the number of regular recurring individual donors and major gifts.

Goal Three: Increase our capacity by hiring additional staff (preferably experienced) in an effort to more efficiently manage corporate volunteer events that are increasingly national and international in scope.

Each year a select number of Jersey Cares professionals participate in the Points of Light (of which Jersey Cares is an independent affiliate organization) Annual Meeting. These professionals are given the opportunity to participate in educational fora and network with non-profit sector leaders.

When the pandemic led to lockdowns and stay at home orders in March 2020, most of our corporate partners put their financial support of Jersey Cares on-hold. It was unclear when, if, and how corporate employees might safely volunteer through our Corporate Service Program – which is the primary source of funding for Jersey Cares. Of course, at the same time the pandemic was creating many dire needs in the communities we serve. Clearly no one was in "business-as-usual-mode", but perhaps now more than ever, our work needed to continue. Our ability to fulfill our mission was being seriously challenged. Despite these challenges, the Jersey Cares staff worked rapidly to develop many new programs and retool our current program offerings as remote/virtual volunteer opportunities. These retooled programs covered a variety of topics, including Educational Videos for schools, Teacher Appreciation, Health Care Appreciation Videos, Senior Grocery Shopping and Senior Pen-Pal programs for senior citizens in assisted living communities, Healthy Food Delivery Programs, and a Diaper Drive, just to name a few. Despite our abilities to adapt to the environment created by the pandemic, Jersey Cares still struggled to obtain what is normally regular funding from corporate partners. What was most important for Jersey Cares at the time was to identify the needs of our nonprofit partners and provide services to those partners as best as we could. Ultimately we secured PPP funding and have refocused our Development team on increasing the number of regular recurring donations received from individuals in an effort to reduce our reliance on large Corporate Sponsors. We have also continued to offer an expanded set of virtual volunteering programs which allow our corporate sponsors who have a national or international footprint to create volunteer events that involve all of their employees and create a greater sense of teamwork and community impact within their organizations.