September was a busy transition month at ECLA.

At the gathering of the Third General Assembly on September 3,2022, the founding board members were recognized for their three-year service and the newly elected board members were seamlessly brought onboard. We wish to thank both the Election Committee and all our members that were involved in the recruitment process for a job well done. We gained eight new board members and four more advisory council members. This new group will serve a two-year term.

We also took time to salute our subcommittee volunteers some of whom had completed one year of service, and some had completed two years of service. These outstanding groups of volunteers carried ECLA through the turbulent two-year pandemic period where we had to make a pivot to being a virtual nonprofit to meet the dire needs of our communities. We were able to livestream two to three expert panel discussions monthly on timely topics such as Covid-19, remote learning, parenting, financial literacy, and various mental health topics. We have uploaded our video links to our website for your convenience and we are now tailoring our services to in-person delivery.

As we get ready to launch the in-person services, we would like to make a plea for more of you to join our volunteer teams. We need more helpers in our Education, Youth, Public Relations, and Parenting subcommittees. ECLA volunteers share the values of inclusiveness, teamwork, accountability, celebrating diversity, and being responsive to community needs. There is a place on our team for everyone. Contact us at info@eclosangeles.org.

We contracted with two Taproot Foundation marketing research volunteers in August to help us understand who our supporters were and what connected them to ECLA. We sent out a survey to our seven hundred plus supporters, but only received 41 responses back which made the sample size too small for a valid interpretation. Just over half of the responders stated they understood ECLA’s mission and that they would renew their memberships. They identified mental health, senior services, housing, and youth services as the most needed services too. We plan to send out the survey again during our

Fall Fundraising Dinner. Information will be forthcoming soon.

We completed implementing our first two-year strategic plan in August, therefore the first order of business the new board will be working on will be developing ECLA’s Five Year Strategic Plan. We are also focusing on grant writing to help fund our mission centric programs.

It is with great excitement that we kickoff the next two years.

As always, do not hesitate to contact us with your questions and comments.

Warm regards,

Hirout Dagnew

Executive Director

ecla.ed@eclosangeles.org