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20/20/20 Full Speed Ahead

My daughter, Jenn, and I just returned from a very quick trip to the San Francisco Bay Area to attend the sixth event in our 20/20/20 program. As you may recall the Rosenberg Fund for Children currently is staging 20 events over a 20 month period to celebrate its 20th anniversary.

This event had a special wrinkle. Organized by Judy Gumbo Albert, the widow of Yippie leader Stew Albert, it was not only an RFC fundraiser but also a celebration of what would have been Stew’s 70th birthday. As is often the case the reception enabled us to reach out to new donors and reunite with old friends. The party was successful and we had a great time. My only regret is that we were greeted with the persistent, penetrating, damp chill that can afflict the Bay Area rather than mild sunshiny weather that can make cameo appearances even in December.

The end of the year is a good time to review how we have done during the first segment of the 20/20/20 campaign. We’ve held six events in the following cities, Albany, Rochester and Buffalo, NY; Seattle, Providence and Berkeley. In total the events were attended by almost 500 people, garnered dozens of new supporters for the RFC and raised $10,393 after expenses were deducted. Since our goal was to generate $1,000 in income after expenses from each event, we have exceeded our expectations even in the midst of the Bush recession!

We’re not resting on our laurels, and are already actively planning events for the first half of 2010. We have receptions scheduled in Florida in South Miami and Delray Beach on January 24th; in Washington, DC on April 10th; Ocean City, NJ on April 11th; Los Angeles on April 25th; Ann Arbor, MI on May 15th; Chicago on May 16th; Brooklyn on June 18th and in Manhattan on the 19th. It makes me a bit tired just to list all nine of them! In addition we are planning a larger anniversary celebration right here at our home base in Easthampton, MA on October 17th.

By then we will have held 16 events with six months still to go in the campaign. Clearly, we’ll hold more than the 20 events we originally planned.

While this is quite labor intensive, I look forward to each occasion because it gives me a chance to interact personally with so many members of our community, and when it’s possible for Jenn to accompany me, to introduce her to our supporters as well. Every place I go I meet active and compassionate people who care about our work as well as many other efforts to improve our world. I hope I get the chance to meet each and every one of you when I come to town.

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We Really Did All That?

At yesterday’s staff meeting, Amber, Jenn and I discussed our plans for the final set of receptions next spring to wrap up our 20/20/20 program. You may recall that we decided to mark our 20th anniversary by staging 20 events, over 20 months, in 20 cities. The first event took place in Albany, NY in September 2009, and we expect the last one to be held in May 2011.

First we reviewed the grid we created almost two years ago of potential dates and sites, and compared that to another grid which reported where and when events actually took place. The original chart, now marked with revisions that obscured some of our initial plans, triggered a memory of how I felt when we created it. It seemed so unlikely that we’d accomplish everything. It was a daunting challenge. But this week’s review demonstrated that we’ve been, with a big assist from so many members of our community, up to the task.

As of now we’ve already produced 20 events. The most recent took place in Toronto on October 30th. I’ve reported on our progress in my thank-you letters to contributors, and predicted that we’d net $50,000 for our beneficiaries by the time we completed this series of programs, but our updated analysis revealed I have been too conservative. To date, we’ve already cleared $47,000, and we still have a bunch of parties to go! That’s correct, 20 events wasn’t enough. The total by next May will be about 25. That means we’ll probably clear closer to $60,000 for our beneficiaries.

Aside from its financial success, I’ve found it exhilarating to interact with hundreds of our supporters and meet hundreds more new friends in people’s homes or in community halls. This is especially so because many of those with whom I’ve spoken are engaged in such good work. I’ve written this before, but it is worth reiterating that despite the mainstream media’s failure to report it, there is a tremendous amount of local progressive organizing going on throughout the country.

So, it’s onward. This Sunday afternoon we’ll hold our 21st affair in Northern New Jersey [click here for details]. Maybe I’ll see a couple of you there. Then, although our plans are still tentative, we hope to hold the following programs: March - Long Beach, CA; April - Madison, WI and Boston, MA; May - Boulder, CO and Portland, OR. And if we haven’t come to your town, don’t feel left out. Just contact us and set up something for next fall. The 20/20/20 program will be over, but the RFC’s work will be far from done.

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