UnitedHealthcare Supports Improvements at Three Volunteers of America Texas Locations
Employees volunteer to beautify outdoor areas at the Yale Street Empowerment Center
HOUSTON – Nov. 14, 2014 – Nearly 100 UnitedHealthcare employees today took part in a volunteer project to help renovate and beautify the community garden and outdoor patio area at Volunteers of America Texas’ Yale Street Empowerment Center. Volunteers helped stain outdoor wood structures, paint of murals, install benches and fencing, and lay weed netting and pavers in the community garden.
Volunteers of America Texas is a faith-based, nonprofit organization that strengthens communities by helping the vulnerable reach their full potential. Services include addiction treatment, affordable housing, intellectual and developmental disabilities services, community re-entry programs and a continuum of support services that address the needs of the whole person.
“We are grateful for the opportunity to support Volunteers of America Texas and its work providing compassionate service to people in need,” said Dave Milich, regional CEO of UnitedHealthcare.
In addition to beautifying the Yale Street Empowerment Center, UnitedHealthcare is helping fund significant improvements to three Volunteers of America Texas facilities. A new playground will be built at the Substance Abuse Treatment and Recovery Center, which keeps children with their mothers who are in the program. Each house at the Center will be equipped with new heating and air conditioning units, and improvements will be made to expand a community garden. New outdoor lighting will be installed at the Yale Street Empowerment Center, improving the overall security of the facility and the safety of the Center’s clients and staff. Furniture designed to support the special needs of clients, both in comfort and stability, will be purchased for the Life Enrichment Center, a day program for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
“The financial contributions of UnitedHealthcare and EcoMedia, coupled with the volunteer work of their employees, will directly benefit the women, children and families we serve,” said Janiece Upshaw, Vice President of Organizational Advancement with Volunteers of America. “I cannot wait to see the looks on our clients’ faces as they step onto the new playground or enter the community garden!”
UnitedHealthcare’s support of Volunteers of America Texas is part of CBS EcoMedia’s WellnessAd program.
“The upgrades to the Yale Street Empowerment Center and the Recovery Center - funded by UnitedHealthcare - will free up critical dollars that can be redirected into essential programs,” said Paul Polizzotto, president and founder of CBS EcoMedia.
This project is the latest in UnitedHealthcare’s “Do Good. Live Well.” employee volunteer initiative, whose mission is to inspire service and encourage volunteerism. For more information about the benefits of volunteering and to find local opportunities to get involved, visit www.DoGoodLiveWell.org. Follow @DoGoodLiveWell on Twitter or “like” Do Good. Live Well. on Facebook.
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About UnitedHealthcare
UnitedHealthcare is dedicated to helping people nationwide live healthier lives by simplifying the health care experience, meeting consumer health and wellness needs, and sustaining trusted relationships with care providers. The company offers the full spectrum of health benefit programs for individuals, employers, military service members, retirees and their families, and Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries, and contracts directly with more than 800,000 physicians and care professionals, and 6,000 hospitals and other care facilities nationwide. Globally, UnitedHealthcare serves 45 million people in health benefits and is one of the businesses of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH), a diversified Fortune 50 health and well-being company. For more information, visit UnitedHealthcare at www.uhc.com or follow @myUHC on Twitter.
About Volunteers of America
Volunteers of America Texas is a faith-based, nonprofit organization that strengthens communities by helping the vulnerable reach their full potential. Services include addiction treatment, affordable housing, intellectual and developmental disabilities services, community re-entry programs and a continuum of support services that address the needs of the whole person. With locations in more than 30 urban and rural communities, Volunteers of America Texas has been helping those who need the most help for close to 100 years. For information, visit www.voatx.org.
About CBS EcoMedia Inc.
At EcoMedia, we’re propelled by the desire to create positive social change; that’s been our mission since we founded the company in 2002. In 2010, after successfully partnering with CBS on a wide range of environmental projects, EcoMedia became the newest addition to the CBS Corporation portfolio, exponentially scaling our reach across television, radio, interactive, publishing and outdoor media.
Through our patent-pending EcoAd, WellnessAd and EducationAd programs, an innovative twist on traditional advertising, advertisers are able to support much-needed local projects which in turn creates jobs, saves taxpayer money and improves the quality of life in communities nationwide. In the process, we’re fundamentally altering the advertising landscape, elevating the ordinary, traditional commercial – and media, in general – into a catalyst for tangible, quantifiable social change. Please visit ecomediacbs.com, like us at facebook.com/EcoMediaCBS or follow us at Twitter.com/EcoMediaCBS.
By participating in EcoMedia’s EcoAd, WellnessAd and EducationAd advertising programs, EcoMedia’s advertisers agree to provide funding for projects we believe will have a beneficial effect upon the environment, health and/or education within local communities. EcoMedia’s advertising programs are not certification programs nor are the EcoAd, WellnessAd or EducationAd logos seals of approval. EcoMedia does not in any way certify, endorse or make any representations about EcoMedia program advertisers, their products or services.
CBS EcoMedia Contact:
Lindsay Brown
212-975-1989
Lindsay.Brown@ecomediacbs.com