Fishers Non-Profit Coalition Meeting Notes

Kickoff Meeting – Wednesday, July 10, 2019 9AM – Launch Fishers

The meeting started at 9:05am.  A sign-in sheet was passed around to attendees.

Jody Britten from the Early Learning Alliance Network welcomed and thanked everyone for attending.  

Attendees introduced themselves and gave a brief overview of their organization.

Alison Gatz from Youth Mentoring Initiative asked Nancy Chance from Good Samaritan Network to give an overview of local nonprofit collaboration.   Nancy discussed the Nonprofit Executive Director group in Hamilton County.  For the last 3 years, the group has been meeting to network and connect to local governments.  Any local nonprofit leaders are welcome to attend the 3rdTuesday each month, 8:30AM at the Hamilton County 4H Fairgrounds Conference Center

There is some concern about duplicating services and causing confusion/eroding quality for any contracted service providers/new entrants to the local nonprofit community

Should there be additional county-wide collaboration?  What are the benefits?

  • Networking
  • Trust building
  • Connectivity
  • Resource/referral ideas
  • Personal relationships to bridge the gap for inconvenient access points or inaccurate online resources

Many other niche groups/coalitions already exist:

  • COAD (Community Organizations Active in Disasters) for Hamilton County
  • Partnership for Health Hamilton County
  • Fishers Mental Health task force
  • Juvenile Justice Alternative program
  • And others

Does this group just focus on entities serving Fishers?

Many online resource websites also already exist:

(https://www.hcla.net/graduates/projects/in-crisis-hamilton-county-an-online-resource-map-connecting-hamilton-county-residents-with-the-resources-they-need.html)

Do we need another website/directory to keep updated?  Potential to streamline these resource channels?  How do we engage the City of Fishers and HSE schools to support nonprofits?

Mayors and City Councils are listening.  The time is right to bring new ideas.

Fishers is risk adverse and stigma still exists.  Fishers also extends to the HSE schools community which includes Noblesville.

Data collection is a challenge across organizations.  Census data is already history.  How can we capture and share more relevant and accurate data to facilitate identification of our changing community, needs and gaps with existing services, grants/funding and collaboration across organizations?

How can we expand community awareness and outreach for our nonprofit organizations?  

  • Would it be possible to expand CurioCity to the broader community to drive engagement and volunteerism?
  • Nonprofit Fair that could include volunteer signups, awareness, problem solving?

What are the next steps for this group?

  • Get more nonprofits involved in the conversation – set another meeting
  • Enhance the Fishers Non-Profit Coalition website (http://fishersnpc.com/) – include service categories and links to the organization websites
  • Invite attendees to the private Facebook group to share events, updates and resources
  • Draft a mission statement for the coalition – clearly define our purpose

If you attended the meeting or are a local not for profit please feel free to complete our planning survey online HERE.