By GREGORY ZELLER //
A leading Long Island utility provider has backed multiple United Way efforts to keep regional families safe and warm this winter.
In January, the National Grid Foundation – the 34-year-old charitable arm of the British multinational utility company – gifted $250,000 in support of two United Way of Long Island programs: Project Warmth, a financial safety net for energy-insecure individuals and families, and Safe at Home for Seniors, designed to assist older populations cut off from their regular resources.
The programs are “critical to helping neighbors who are experienced financial difficulties and/or isolation due to job issues, mandates and limited resources,” according to a statement from the Deer Park-based United Way of Long Island.
Theresa Regnante: Committed partner.
Referencing the lingering effects of the COVID pandemic, National Grid Foundation Executive Director Ed White noted the joint donation was made during an “especially difficult” time for many Long Islanders.
“We are witnessing families asking for help for the first time,” White said. “It’s comforting to know Project Warmth is available to Long Islanders, helping to provide the stability needed to overcome temporary economic challenges.”
Project Warmth is a is a fuel-neutral program designed specifically for energy-insecure consumers – including seniors, veterans, persons with disabilities and families with young children – who don’t qualify for government assistance. The idea is to provide help with an individual oil delivery or heat-related utility bill, creating room in tight budgets for food and medication.
Through the Safe at Home for Seniors effort, United Way of Long Island is partnering with a network of regional social agencies to connect isolated Long Island seniors with “bilingual community navigators” who can help with everyday tasks – grocery shopping and picking up prescriptions, for instance – while ensuring proper in-home safety protocols and providing other well-care services.
United Way of Long Island President and CEO Theresa Regnante called the National Grid Foundation, which has supported Project Warmth in the past, “a stellar philanthropic organization.”
“National Grid Foundation’s commitment to United Way’s mission is evident through their longstanding support for Project Warmth,” Regnante said in a statement. “Now it is even more apparent through their action in support of addressing serious challenges facing our region’s most vulnerable population: seniors.”
