United Way of Southeast Minnesota’s Board of Directors recently approved $707,900 in funding for more than 23 programs and organizations across Olmsted, Dodge, and Fillmore Counties. These investments address critical needs in health, youth opportunity, financial security, and community resiliency.
As families face rising costs for housing, utilities, food, and childcare, local support is increasily important. Local ALICE data shows that more than 35% of households in the region live paycheck to paycheck, while United Way's 211 data points to growing demand for essential services.
“For more than 100 years, United Way investments have started with community members choosing to give," said Jerome Ferson, President of United Way of Southeast Minnesota. "Together, we can make Southeast Minnesota an even better place to live, work, and raise a family.”
Donor generosity and strong local partnerships make this work possible. Explore our program partners below and see how these investments are helping Southeast Minnesota thrive.
2026-2027 Funded Partners
Byron School Readiness
Partner: Byron Public Schools
Byron School Readiness gives 3-5 year-old children access to preschool education, creating affordable education and childcare through tuition scholarships. Wrap-around care options ensure that children and families get the support they need to succeed.
Community Schools
Fiscal sponsor: Rochester Public Schools
Community Schools are partnerships between Rochester Public Schools, United Way of Southeast Minnesota, the individual school site, and other community resources. In this sense, a community school is both a place and an idea. Thanks to these collaborations, teachers can focus on academics while community-based organizations support students’ wellbeing. These services connect students to resources that positively impact their health, give them opportunities to engage in community and leadership development, and ensure they and their families have their basic needs met.
Gage East Early Childhood
Partner: Center City Housing
The Gage East Early Childhood program is a two-generation model working with homeless parents and young children to meet social, emotional, and developmental outcomes early on, when the chance of having a deep impact is the greatest. Developing early relationships with parents builds a strong foundation that promotes healthy brain development, builds social and emotional skills, and supports language and literacy development. Interventions including parents are as important as focusing on children themselves to achieve positive health outcomes for children and increase stability for the whole family.
School Readiness
Partner: Families First of Minnesota
The School Readiness program provides preschool opportunities to prepare families and children for school success. School readiness offers benefits for families who may not be able to access quality early childhood educational opportunities on their own, including preschool scholarships, parent education, community referrals, and home visits. Partner preschools receive curriculum and assessment support.
GNCC Early Learning
Partner: Good News Children’s Center
GNCC Early Learning provides high-quality childcare and early education to a diverse group of Rochester area families. United Way funding helps provide scholarships for families facing financial barriers, so every child has equitable access to the best start in life.
Housing Stability Fund
Partner: Women’s Shelter and Support Center
The Housing Stability Fund helps domestic violence survivors secure and retain safe, affordable housing. The Fund helps survivors with move-in costs, such as first-month rent, damage deposits, and utility costs. Survivors who already have housing get assistance avoiding eviction by receiving support for overdue rent payments and utility expenses.
Access Home
Partner: The Salvation Army
Access Home is a rapid re-housing program that serves homeless individuals and families. The program provides help with housing search and placement, rental application fees and deposits, and an ongoing rent subsidy that gradually diminishes as household income and independence increases. As the program ends, people remain in their current home where they can now independently pay rent.
Eviction Prevention Program
Partner: Legal Assistance of Olmsted County
The Eviction Prevention Program clinic is the only civic legal aid resource providing legal representation for low-income tenants facing eviction in Olmsted County. Staff attorneys help tenants defend their eviction cases by negotiating settlements, taking cases to trial, and seeking expungements. With legal representation, many tenants are able to maintain stable housing. Through expungements, the program helps tenants avoid a record of eviction that would make it more difficult to obtain housing in the future.
Shelter Prevention and Diversion
Partner: Family Promise Rochester
Shelter Prevention and Diversion prevents families from needing to access emergency shelter by providing services to help families maintain their housing when they are at imminent risk of becoming homeless or avoiding a shelter stay when a family has already lost their housing. Prevention services can include paying delinquent rent or utilities, helping with vehicle repairs so they can continue to work, assisting with childcare, or other interventions that help to stabilize the family. Diversion services include making down payments, security deposits, or utility payments so families can secure stable housing in lieu of accessing Family Promise’s emergency shelter services.
Independent Living Program
Partner: Bear Creek Services
The Bear Creek Independent Living Services (BCILS) program supports people who have disabilities to live in locations of their choosing, with people of their choosing. BCILS staff assist individuals in many areas of their lives, depending on the person's goals and needs at the time. For example, staff may assist clients with housekeeping, cooking, budgeting, personal hygiene, and healthcare management. Staff also help clients access public transportation so that they can connect with other community members. As a person’s needs change, the area of focus for the staff can change. This program allows for smoother transitions in schedule changes with our on-call 24-hour emergency assistance service. Bear Creek staff teach skills that allow people to do more things without staff assistance, so each person can be empowered to live as independently and safely as possible.
Dental Home for Underserved Children
Partner: Children’s Dental Health Services
The program serves children who lack dental insurance and who otherwise could not afford routine exams, dental cleanings, and comprehensive care. Staff use both school-based clinics and the CDHS office in Rochester to ensure that time, money, and transportation are not barriers to receiving care. By providing a full suite of free dental services during school visits and office follow-ups, CDHS is removing barriers to care and improving health equity for the youngest members of our community. Partner: Children’s Dental Health Services
Pediatric Services
Partner: Community Health Service, Inc
The Pediatric Services program will provide routine vaccinations and other preventative care, acute medical care, and wrap-around social services for children in Olmsted County. This program will establish a pediatric clinic at CHSI's Rochester office with oversight from a board-certified pediatrician. They will also host monthly pediatric clinics with a special focus on children of immigrants, seasonal farm workers, and other uninsured patients. CHSI employs a diverse and dedicated group of clinical and support staff who understand the barriers to healthcare and actively work to make patients feel welcome and safe.
Medical Transportation Program
Partner: Elder Network
Each year, Elder Network staff coordinate approximately 1,850 rides for clients, prioritizing clients who live in low-income households and/or in rural areas of Olmsted County, those who are immigrants, and seniors who are BIPOC. Transportation is provided by volunteer drivers to and from crucial health care appointments such as medical, dental, and mental health appointments, medical equipment fitting appointments, and the pharmacy. Elder Network's Medical Transportation Program is tailored to the needs of seniors by breaking down typical logistic and financial barriers to service for seniors. Clients can book an affordable ride for a specific day and time and trust that a friendly volunteer will call to remind them the night before and be there to walk them door-to-door on the day of service.
Auxiliary Services for East African Women
Partner: Pamoja Women (fiscal sponsor: Rochester Area Foundation)
Pamoja Women offers monthly health education programming on health issues facing East African women, assists with navigation through healthcare resources, offers interpretation and provides transportation. Often, the people served by Pamoja Women don't understand how to access the healthcare they need, face language barriers that prevent them from receiving healthcare and particularly elders don't have transportation to access healthcare. The goal of the Pamoja Women Auxiliary Services program is to ensure that women and children of East African descent can understand and access the health and wellness resources available to them without barriers. The program offers monthly health education groups, individualized medical navigation services, interpretation, and transportation for medical appointments.
Street Medicine
Partner: Zumbro Valley Medical Society Foundation
The Zumbro Valley Medical Society (ZVMS) Street Medicine Initiative brings healthcare out of the traditional clinical setting and directly to people experiencing unstable housing. It involves caring for individuals in their own environments, rather than requiring them to adapt to medicines conventional settings and structures. Central to their program is a recognition of the need to build trust and gain rapport in serving a population that has faced trauma and stigma. To achieve the ZVMS Street Medicine Initiatives goal of offering high quality, compassionate healthcare to people experiencing houselessness, they provide direct care through visits to encampments, under bridges, on street corners, and in other locations where people might be; and through specialized one-day clinics in the community throughout the year.
Transportation Assistance
Partner: Dodge County Salvation Army
This new program will increase the availability of transportation vouchers throughout Dodge County and especially for rural residents in the county. Dodge County Salvation Army will be partnering with Rolling Hills Transit, which will provide the transportation service so individuals can have free rides throughout Dodge County.
Dual Diagnosis Support Group
Partner: NAMI Southeast Minnesota
NAMI’s Dual Diagnosis support group is a free peer-led group for individuals living with both a mental illness and substance use disorder. This program is a place for sharing knowledge and resources unique to the Dodge County community and providing guidance rooted in lived experience. Participants connect with others who understand their struggles, reduce feelings of isolation, and build resilience.
Kasson Contact Center
Partner: Semcac
Semcac’s Resource Navigation program provides in-person resource navigation support. This program increases Dodge County resident’s access to a variety of programs and services through compassionate and knowledgeable care.
Kasson-Mantorville Care and Share
Partner: Kasson-Mantorville School District
The Kasson-Mantorville Care and Share hardship fund, which is provided in coordination with Kasson-Mantorville School District, Semcac, and Dodge County Salvation Army provides financial support to families in Kasson and Mantorville who are facing unforeseen financial crises that could severely impact their housing stability by providing rent assistance.
last updated July 21, 2026 9:27 AM