Newsletters

JULY NEWSLETTER

COME ONE ... COME ALL TO THE GREATEST KICKOFF ON EARTH!

Capital Area United Way will host its 21st Annual Campaign Kickoff and Jambalaya Cookoff on Thursday, July 17, 2008 at the Baton Rouge River Center Exhibition Hall from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. There will be free rides, games, and activities for the kids along with special appearances by RING MASTERS, Hollywood Hal and Rhinestone Al!

Register to win door prizes while enjoying $3 lunches. General admission is free.

Thanks to all of our sponsors for this year's event:

Capital One Bank, Mall at Cortana, Baton Rouge River Center, Hollywood Hal & Rhinestone Al, USS KIDD Veterans Memorial, ExxonMobil-Baton Rouge, The Advocate, Lamar Advertising, Around Town Show, Country Roads Magazine, Baton Rouge Business Report, 225 Magazine, NEW COUNTRY 100.7, Hometown Productions, Inc., City Social Magazine, Baton Rouge Parents Magazine, AT&T, Baton Rouge Coca-Cola Bottling Company, AV Express, Jacobs Engineering Group, FASTSIGNS, Americas Styrenics, LLC, Krazy Kajun Cookware and Catering, Louisiana Fish Fry Products, Ltd., Tony's Seafood, Silk Screen Shop, Inc., Lindsey's Spacewalks & Amusements, Dow Chemical Company, East Baton Rouge Sherriff's Office, Allied Waste Services, Louisiana Arts & Science Museum, Belle of Baton Rouge Casino, Manda Fine Meats, Motiva Enterprises, Acadian Frame and Art, Louisiana Lottery Corporation, Holiday Inn Select Executive Center, Audubon Nature Institute, Blue Bayou Water Park & Dixie Landin' Amusement Park, The Pampered Chef, River Road Coffees, Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, Billy Heroman's Flowerland, Louie's Café, National World War II Museum, and McLlhenny Company

Special thanks to all companies that have registered Jambalaya Cooking Teams for this year's event:

The Advocate, Americas Styrenics, LLC, Atmos Energy, BASF Corporation, Baton Rouge Coca-Cola Bottling Company, Baton Rouge Water Company, Capital One Bank, CF Industries, Inc., Chemtech Chemical Services, Dow Chemical Company, Entergy River Bend & IBEW Local Union 2286, ExxonMobil-Baton Rouge, ExxonMobil BRPO, Ferro Corporation, Formosa Plastics, Gramercy Alumina, LLC, INEOS Fluor America, LLC, Jacobs Engineering Group, Inc., Manda Fine Meats, Mosaic Fertilizer, LLC, Motiva Enterprises, LLC, NPC Services, Inc., PCS Nitrogen, Shell Chemical Company, Geismar, Shell Chemical Company, LP, Southern University, Stupp Corporation, Total Petrochemicals USA, Inc., and Westlake Chemical Company

CAPITAL AREA UNITED WAY MEDIA APPEARANCES COMING UP

Make sure to watch your local news for upcoming CAUW interviews. Upcoming interviews include:

Around Town Show - July 13, 2008
Baton Rouge Lagniappe Show - July 12, 2008
WAFB Morning News- July 14, 2008
Coverage at CAUW's Campaign Kickoff/Jambalaya Cookoff - July 17, 2008
Breakfast with 2une In - July 18, 2008

2008 CHEMICAL AND INDUSTRIAL CAMPAIGN FORUM

Capital Area United Way (CAUW) hosted a campaign networking event for all Chemical and Industrial businesses within its 10-parish service area on Friday, June 27, 2008 at Holiday Inn Select. Chemical and Industrial companies currently running CAUW campaigns or interested in starting a campaign at their workplace were invited. Eighty individuals were in attendance with four new companies committing to running a new workplace giving campaign.

Dave Luecke, Plant Manager for ExxonMobil BRPP and CAUW’s Industrial Unit Campaign Chair, opened this forum by thanking all those in attendance and introducing key CAUW volunteers and staff members that will be helping these companies throughout this year’s campaign and beyond.

The purpose of this event was to discuss issues affecting the 10-parish Capital Area and to explain how CAUW is addressing these issues. Rolfe McCollister, 2008 CAUW Campaign Chair, presented several statistics illustrating growing needs in our community. One statistic illustrated an average of 19 percent of the 10-parish community population living below the poverty level. McCollister stated that higher poverty levels produce more problems such as unemployment, homelessness, and hunger and that CAUW is working towards lasting change by focusing on root causes of problems in our community and channeling resources to address these problems.

CAUW has already developed new initiatives that will support this change:

Partnership with LSU to determine benchmarks around social issues in our Capital Area focusing on core community issues
Continuing to grow CAUW’s volunteer event, Day of Caring
Growing the 50 for the Future program which recruits new, young volunteers to get involved with community issues through CAUW

Tobie Craig, Turner Industries’ Corporate Resource Coordinator and CAUW’s Campaign Chair-Elect, spoke about CAUW’s Workplace Giving Campaigns. Craig stated that 68% of all CAUW workplace giving contributions come strictly from employee giving and that the easiest way to give is through payroll deduction. Turner Industries is a large contributor to CAUW with donations excess of $1 million.

Special thanks to Holiday Inn Select, ExxonMobil Corporation, Desselle Maggard Corporation, Shell Chemical Company, Mosaic Company, and Dow Chemical Company for sponsoring this event.

For more information on how you and/or your company can participate in CAUW's 2008 Campaign, click here to be redirected to the "Interested in Running a Campaign?" section of our website.

CAMPAIGN EVENTS


Cancer Services' participating in their own "Purse Game" to benefit CAUW's 2008 Campaign.	Nancy Eckert, CAUW staff, accepting AT&T donation from Rick Demint, AT&T External Affairs Manager.

Chemical and Industrial Companies signing in at the 2008 Chemical and Industrial Campaign Forum	Rolfe McCollister addressing attendees at the 2008 Chemical and Industrial Campaign Forum

THIRD ANNUAL SINGLE MOTHER'S CONFERENCE

“Building The Next Generation TOGETHER:
Empowering the Single Mother on Her Journey to Independence"

The mission of this conference is for community partners to provide information, resources, support, and empowerment to single mothers as they raise our future, the next generation. The goal of this conference is to empower the single mother and to strengthen the family.

This free event will be held Saturday, July 19, 2008 from 10AM - 2PM at the Baranco Clark YMCA, 1735 Thomas Delpit Drive, Baton Rouge. Mayor Kip Holden and other professionals will offer tips that could improve careers, finances, and so much more.

Please call 225-343-8330 to register. The deadline to register is Monday, July 14, 2008. Registration will not be allowed the day of the event due to limited seating. For more information on O'Brien House, log on to www.obrienhouse.org.

UPCOMING CLASSES AVAILABLE AT RED CROSS

Babysitter Training Classes

The Ultimate Babysitter's Training Course is being offered at the following times to boys and girls, aged 11 through 15.

Participants will learn in the two-day course how to best:

Supervise children
Choose safe and appropriate toys
Handle bedtime issues effectively
Keep children safe in the house or outside
Perform first aid, including responding effectively to life-threatening emergenices
Feed infants and prepare simple meals and snacks for children
Perform basic care routines, such as diapering, feeding and dressing infants and children

Participants in the three-day mini camp will also have information on Pet First Aid.

The five-day camps, held in June and July, will include all the basic information already listed above and extra trainings in disaster education (hurricanes, tornadoes, thunderstorms, and fire safety); drug awareness, peer pressure, stranger danger and online predators (a partnership with the local D.A.R.E. program and police department); pet safety and treatment (which includes community veterinarians and a field trip to the local zoo); financial planning and literacy (partnered with local financial institutions); and water safety.

Upcoming dates, times and costs:

Ultimate Babysitting Mini-Camp (3-day)
- July 14 -16, 2008
- $110.00
Ultimate Babysitter Camp (5-day)
- June 9 - 13, 2008 OR
- June 23 - 27, 2008 OR
- July 7 - 11, 2008
- $225.00