YMCA/JCC receives nonprofit excellence award

YMCA and JCC of Greater Toledo was recently awarded an Ohio Nonprofit Excellence Award sponsored by the Ohio Association of Nonprofit Organizations (OANO) for its Summer Fun Buses, a project that provides recreational programs for disadvantaged youth.

The award recognizes creativity, execution, achievement, and overall excellence of a specific project or program completed by an Ohio nonprofit organization in 2008.

Three Summer Fun Buses, equipped with recreational equipment, travel to low-income neighborhoods to provide free recreational programs for area youth.  The Summer Fun Bus project, funded in part by United Way of Greater Toledo, was created after the city eliminated many summer youth programs. 

During a twelve-week time span, the Summer Fun Bus program provided activities for 14,249 youth in Toledo’s most impoverished neighborhoods, rural Perrysburg and at LMHA housing locations.  The program also serves as an information distribution center for parents to receive materials on immunizations and public assistance.

More than 100 organizations submitted applications for the award.  OANO chose nonprofits in three Ohio regions—YMCA and JCC of Greater Toledo won the award for the North region.