Urban League affiliates in Atlanta, Chicago, Cincinnati, Dayton and Houston are working to help families and communities recover from the economic, educational and health impacts of COVID-19.
Chicago Urban League
The Chicago Urban League has launched a COVID-19 Community Help Center to assist small business owners, homeowners, job seekers, students and families in managing through and recovering from negative impacts of the pandemic. The Help Center offers the following services:
- Support for Small Business Owners
- Assistance with applying for COVID-19 financial relief
- Referral to alternative funding sources for those who do not qualify for federal, state or municipal relief
- Credit counseling
- Procurement opportunities and technical assistance
- One-on-One coaching
- Support for Job Seekers
- Job search assistance and placement
- Career coaching
- Credit and budget counseling
- Workforce preparation
- Assistance with interview apparel
- Connection to community resources
- Support for Students, Youth and Families
- Tutoring
- STEAM educational enhancement through summer programming
- Crisis support and management through social emotional learning
- College access
- Career support
- Resources and referrals
- Support for Homeowners and Renters (The Chicago Urban League is a HUD-certified housing counseling agency.)
- Rental assistance supported by a certified rental counselor
- First-time homebuyer counseling
- Foreclosure prevention counseling
- Credit counseling
- Support for Emerging Leaders
- Dedicated LinkedIn group for African American professionals to share experiences, insights and questions on leading through the pandemic
Other Help Center components that are still in development include:
- Support for Health and Wellness
- Virtual health sessions and seminars delivered in partnership with health professionals
- Wellness checks
- Healthcare Advocate Program
- Support for Emerging Leaders
- Crisis leadership webinars and workshops
Houston Area Urban League
The Houston Area Urban League (HAUL) is committed to keeping our clients, community, staff, volunteers and supporters out of harm’s way during this COVID 19 crisis. HAUL’s efforts include:
- Implementing COVID 19 Disaster services. With the help of our many supporters we are assisting clients by providing critical services to families to obtain resources they need and helping to navigate processes to address housing, healthcare, academic engagement, employment transition and finances.
- Offering COVID-specific counseling to assist with basic needs, fair housing, unemployment benefits, disaster preparedness and case management. Services assess individual/family unmet needs helping them develop an Individual Recovery Plan. Services include activities to address business disruption, job loss and resource distribution of grocery gift cards, rent or mortgage assistance and utilities.
- Providing resources within each service area below:
- Food Access
- Flexible Emergency Financial Assistance
- Emergency Financial Assistance and Financial/Housing Counseling
- Housing and Homeless Prevention Solutions
- Employment and Re-employment Services
- Small Business Assistance
- System Response Coordination
Urban League of Greater Atlanta
The Urban League of Greater Atlanta has launched a new integrated economic mobility model as a Financial Empowerment Center (FEC) in metro Atlanta. The FEC is an evidence-based model that represents a partnership with the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) – Atlanta and partners we have worked with to support clients over the years. For the foreseeable future, until our communities and nation stabilize from the COVID 19 pandemic and our fight for racial and economic justice is achieved, our FEC will operate as a Financial Empowerment and Emergency Response Center (FEERC).
We are serving as an Economic First Responder andNavigator for our community, which needs our help now more than ever to address financial and emotional hardships, resources to meet basic needs, re-employment and skills upgrades, gain access to healthcare, housing and small business assistance during this time of emergency. The FEERC has also established an Emergency Assistance Fund that will support our most vulnerable citizens with rent, utilities, food and other basic needs. The Urban League needs your partnership and financial support now more than ever. We ask for your generous contributions and there are two ways you can support:
- General operations of the FEERC/ULGA
- Emergency Relief Fund
The FEERC will deliver direct services and manage a restricted fund for direct emergency assistance to older youth, adults, parents, seniors and families in need.
The Volunteer Needs of the ULGA
The ULGA is a dynamic organization that offers a variety of volunteer opportunities for ITW associates to bring their talents, time and treasure to advance our mission as follows:
- Serve as Instructors, Presenters and /or Coaches for the following education/training focus areas:
- Career and Workforce Development (Adults, Youth and Young Adults)
- Career Readiness Training
- Career Exploration Presenters
- The Entrepreneurship Center
- Start Up Accelerator Training & Coaching
- Strategic Growth Accelerator Training & Coaching
- Next Level Enterprise Training & Coaching
- Financial Literacy and Wealth Building
- Financial Literacy Training Classes
- Household Budget Assistance
- Credit Counseling
- Career and Workforce Development (Adults, Youth and Young Adults)
- Serve as Emergency Assistance Fund Volunteer Empowerment Advocates
- Support the agency to be responsive to community requests for emergency assistance to facilitate the intake process to identify needs and match to agency resources.
Urban League of Greater Southwestern Ohio
Urban League of Greater Southwestern Ohio COVID-19 relief efforts include:
- Distributing masks, hand sanitizer, and gloves in Black communities (Mask What Matters: Protecting Our Community; more details below)
- Developing and distributing videos and infographics to keep communities updated and informed during the COVID-19 pandemic (Coronavirus 101; more details below)
- Providing advice on homeschooling
- Hosting Q & A with Black medical practitioners
- Hosting discussions around domestic violence during the pandemic
- Providing assistance in navigating COVID-19’s mental health impact
Mask What Matters: Protecting our Community is a PPE campaign launched by ULSGO. Our goal is to ensure our community has access to critical PPE Items. During this unprecedented time, items such as masks, hand sanitizer and gloves have become essential items. We have already distributed over 17,000 masks, 5,000 bottles of hand sanitizer and sets of gloves in hard-hit COVID-19 areas of Cincinnati and Dayton, but our community needs more! Therefore, we hope to expand our efforts into other impacted Tristate areas.
Coronavirus 101 is an awareness initiative to deliver timely and informative videos, infographics, and community town halls to the public via Facebook. Each week we present a virtual series dedicated to keeping the community updated and informed during the unprecedented times of COVID-19. We have produced 10 videos with featured speakers and topics such as; Conversation with Richard Lofgren, President & CEO of UC Health; Navigating the Small Business Administration CARES ACT; Covid-19’s impact on mental health; Advice on homeschooling; Conversation with black coronavirus survivors; Q & A with black medical practitioners; and discussion around domestic violence, in partnership with Women Helping Women. Since launching this series, we have had about 52,000 impressions and video views have increased by 197% and followers by 655% within the last 30-days of producing relevant content. We hope to continue to educate and uplift our community.
