BLOUNT COUNTY, Tenn. — It's been a busy week for the United Way of Blount County as staff and volunteers work to determine which nonprofits get funding from their donations.
For Renee Poole, the Community Impact Chair, the process is her favorite volunteer commitment in East Tennessee. It's known as "allocation panels."
It's an eight-day process that's a lot of work and fun, she said.
"So mostly my role is to observe and support, make sure that when I go to the board, I'm representing the panels with their thoughts and recommendations that they want to make for each of the programs," she said.
The panels consist of Blount County volunteers who spend around seven hours in one day listening to presentations and touring nonprofits who've applied for grant funding from the United Way.
This year, there's $2.2 million of grant money to go around thanks to support from people across the county, said United Way of Blount County President and CEO Jennifer Wackerhagen.
She said the nonprofit hasn't seen these kinds of donations since the recession in 2008.
"We have about 80 people who have volunteered their time, they're giving up the whole day to review grant applications from our partner agencies," Wackerhagen said. "They go on tour and hear presentations from our partner agencies, then make funding decisions for those agencies."
Wackerhagen said the programs these grants fund can be life-changing and life-saving.
She said partner agency Smoky Mountain Meals on Wheels was able to help a client in medical distress recently because a person delivering his food noticed something was wrong, jumped into action and called emergency services.
"I thought, 'Wow, these United Way dollars are actually helping people by giving them a meal and giving them the nutrition they need,'" she said. "But it's also giving them just a contact and also a check-in from the community."
Paycheck deductions from people in Blount County are partially fueling the increase in donations, she said.