News | Article from San Bernardino County Sun

SB's nonprofits gather to coordinate efforts

By Michael Sorba, Staff Writer

San Bernardino (October 16, 2007) - Members of San Bernardino's nonprofit community gathered at the National Orange Show's Valencia Room on Sept. 27 to discuss methods of better pooling resources and serving the community.

The event, dubbed the "Operation Phoenix Summit," was organized by the office of Mayor Pat Morris, Children's Network - a county agency that provides services for at-risk youth - and the Nonprofit Executive Network, a network of community-based organizations that serve San Bernardino.

The purpose of the summit was to form partnerships between the city and local nonprofit organizations in program development and resource-sharing to better serve the citizens of the community, according to Kent Paxton, the mayor's liaison in community safety and violence prevention.

"There are a lot of needs in San Bernardino," Paxton said, "and most are just basic needs, like food, shelter and drug and alcohol (abuse) prevention programs."

Paxton says 25 percent of the county's 211 calls for service came from the city of San Bernardino.

"That is a very large percentage to be coming from one city, considering the size of our county," Paxton said.

The 211 hot line is similar to a 411 call to information. However, the 211 service is intended for those who need help finding a service or organization offered by the county, such as a drug or alcohol rehabilitation program.
Paxton says the nonprofit community needs to work together to leverage more dollars to serve the basic needs of the city.

"This summit is taking place to figure out how the nonprofit community can better leverage their resources to get more state, federal and foundation money to serve the community of San Bernardino," said Paxton.

Ruben Gonzalez of the Latino Health Collaborative was the event's keynote speaker. He spoke about the importance of the effective and efficient use of resources.

"There are very anemic levels of giving in the Inland Empire," Gonzalez said. "This summit is a call to action to organize the nonprofit sector to cooperate with city government to build and strengthen a vibrant and healthy San Bernardino."

An afternoon breakout session took place at the summit where representatives from different nonprofit organizations got together to discuss various strategies for partnership and collaboration. The groups then forwarded their ideas to the Nonprofit Executive Network. The ideas gathered at the Operation Phoenix Summit will be reviewed by the Nonprofit Executive Network during its monthly meetings.

Organizers hope the information gathered will lead to the development of strategies that will allow them to better help those in need.

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