Best Place to Work: Blueprints
Blueprints
Though Blueprints did not win the best place to work honor, the nonprofit did take home two awards, including best employment agency. Mark Marietta/for the Observer-Reporter
Mark Marietta/for the Observer-Reporter
Though Blueprints did not win the best place to work honor, they did take home two awards, including best overall business in Greene County.
Poverty knows no boundaries and impacts the lives of individuals and families across the country, including here in Pennsylvania.
Blueprints, formerly Community Action Southwest, is a nonprofit organization whose programs act as a catalyst to mobilize the resources of the entire community, enabling families and individuals to attain the skills, knowledge, motivations and opportunities to become self-sufficient.
Blueprints serves 20,000 residents in Greene County, Washington County, and West Virginia, said Jeff Fondelier, vice president of operations.
Fondelier said Blueprints operates under a $37 million budget and employs 310 employees.
“Our network and staff are a passionate group of people that have dedicated their professional lives to making tomorrow better today for people in economic transition,” he said. “We are part of the anti-poverty movement. We mobilize the resources of the community to help people change the trajectory of their lives. We have programs such as head start, foreclosure mitigation and career development. We do anything that a low-income individual or family might need to change the direction of their lives.”
In 2020, there were 37.2 million people in poverty, approximately 3.3 million more than in 2019, according to the U.S. Census Bureau website.
Between 2019 and 2020, the poverty rate increased for non-Hispanic whites and Hispanics. Among non-Hispanic whites, 8.2 percent were in poverty in 2020, while Hispanics had a poverty rate of 17.0 percent.
Among the major racial groups examined in this report, Black people had the highest poverty rate (19.5 percent) but did not experience a significant change from 2019.
Fondelier said that in Washington County, 8.6 percent of its residents live in poverty, and in Green County, 12.7 percent of its residents live in poverty.
“It (poverty) is an issue,” he said.
Fondelier said Blueprints underwent a rebranding in 2017 to reflect its mission better.
“We rebranded about five years ago and renamed ourselves Blueprints for a number of reasons. First and foremost, the directional term in our name Community Action Southwest didn’t make sense after we acquired a foster care and adoption agency known as Try Again Homes that had operations in West Virginia,” he said.
Blueprints was recently named as one of the top three places to work in the region, according to the Observer-Reporter’s Best of the Best awards.
Fondelier said Blueprints is grateful for the recognition.
“I am incredibly gratified, and the entire leadership are gratified to be recognized as a top workplace in our county,” he said. “The leadership of our organization is committed to managing the evolution of these new realities, and we try to create a workplace that values our staff, their time, their talent and their dedication and loyalty.”
Fondelier said Blueprints’ staff are guided in their work by a set of principles and values.
“We include our staff in decision-making and in our programs,” he said. “We like to think of ourselves as creative and innovative. We are entrepreneurial, and we like to say we are intelligent risk-takers. We actively pursue and embrace and depend on collaborative partnerships with other nonprofits in the area to pursue our mission. We certainly pursue excellence in our work and our outcomes. I think our company culture is supportive of open communication and learning and collaboration.”
Fondelier said Blueprints, like other nonprofits, has had to adapt to changing times, including during the COVID-19 pandemic.
He said the company offers retention bonuses, hybrid/remote and in-office work for most employees, and generous vacation, personal and sick leave packages.
Fondelier said clients also have the opportunity to get hired by Blueprints as they work their way out of their poverty situation.
“They have an opportunity to advance within the company,” he said.
Fondelier said Blueprint employees are dedicated to making a difference.
“That is the way they are wired, to put their time and talent towards making other people’s lives better,” he said. “There is no feeling like it. We do our best work, and nobody knows that we did it.”
Fondelier said Blueprints works with its community partners to help break the poverty cycle.
“We are not going to be able to end poverty on our own,” he said. “We need to engage the community. If we are successful at advancing our mission, then everybody benefits. The goal is to break that cycle.”
For more information about Blueprints, located at 150 W. Beau St., Suite 106 in Washington, visit myblueprints.org