News & Events
March 8 , 2010
Dear Friends,
As you may recall a few weeks ago Wyoming Park United Methodist Church did a fundraiser for a five non-profits, including SECOM. If you were there, I thought you might be interested in seeing pictures from the event. And if you weren't there, this is what you missed.
No doubt Wyoming Park does have talent and everyone enjoyed seeing it on display. Thank you to everyone at the church for helping to support SECOM. If you missed this event, there is a tentative plan to have a barbecue in the church parking lot this summer.
You may also recall that Maple Hill Golf Course gave discounts to everyone who donated food starting at the beginning of November last year and running through the end of the year. Recently staff from the course dropped off the 1,561 pounds of food that was collected.
We are very appreciative of both of these acts of generosity. The immediate reason for our gratitude is seasonal. It is typical for donations to decline after the holidays without a corresponding decline in demand. That makes these gifts timely in our efforts to maintain services during the next few months.
The other reason for our gratitude is that the nature of the current downturn is leaving many people to face unemployment for many years to come according to a recent New York Times article. (Please go to bit.ly/cvSdZH to see the full article).
There are a couple of reasons for this:
The kinds of jobs that are being created today often require skills that the unemployed do not possess.
The way the economy functions today makes job creation more scarce.
How has the functioning of the economy changed?
- Temporary and part-time workers are making up a greater part of the work force,
- More work, not just factory work, is being sent to low cost countries.
- Payrolls are reduced more quickly then they were in the past.
Lakshman Achtuman, managing director of the Economic Cycle Research Institute, is quoted in the NY Times article as saying that, "job growth has been getting weaker with each economic expansion and there is no indication that this pattern is about to change."
This will be a big challenge for human services agencies. The current social safety net may not be up to the task some poverty experts are saying. Faced with the prospect that we may be looking at many years with persistently high unemployment, it is important that we do not become discouraged.
It will take time to retrain and reeducate people. During that time we will will need to feed, house and provide medical care for them. All of that will strain the resources of the social services agencies.
Which brings me back to why I am so grateful to Wyoming Park UMC, Maple Hill Golf Course and so many others in West Michigan for supporting SECOM and the other agencies. Without the generosity of our community it would certainly be a bleak future for all of us.
Best regards,
John R. Smith
Executive Director