Dear Friends,
This past week, Isles turned 35. For me, it’s been a labor of love, allowing us to continually ask – and answer – one basic question, “What are the most powerful, low cost ways to develop self-reliant families and healthy, sustainable communities?” As you can see, we’ve settled on four key ways to do that: redevelop places and communities, build wealth, restore healthy environments, and educate and train residents.
While this approach, by design, works with local communities or ‘isles’, we increasingly influence others as well. By learning from our successes and failures, we help governments and private groups impact their own communities beyond central New Jersey.
For example, we’ve learned how lead and other environmental hazards make homes the most dangerous places for kids, thousands of whom are permanently damaged annually in New Jersey. We’ve also learned to remove and seal out lead in homes that poison those kids. Over the past few years, we uniquely renovated over 170 homes for under $7,000/unit, rendering them safe and energy efficient at the same time.
The debacle in Flint, Michigan brought media exposure and attention to our work (and its cost effectiveness). The result is a recent breakthrough in New Jersey: Governor Christie just committed $10 million to get more lead out of NJ homes. Our partners, the Housing & Community Development Network, New Jersey Citizen Action, the Anti-Poverty Network of NJ, and others collaborated to make this happen.
In this case, we tested, learned, taught others, and advocated to earn this progress. But this meant we needed flexible funding, like that provided by the 300 institutions and 1,000 individuals who donated to Isles. That is why you are so important!
For more info, check out our recent newsletter/annual report here.
Join the good work, help us celebrate 35 years of impact, and tell us what you think.
In community,
Marty
Steven P. Goodell is a partner at Herbert Van Ness Cayci & Goodell, concentrating his practice in the areas of municipal law, litigation in all courts, zoning and land use. Mr. Goodell received his A.B. from Bucknell University, with honors, and his J.D. from the University of Texas School of Law. He is admitted to the bars of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, the District Court for the District of New Jersey, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Goodell, a former Mercer County assistant prosecutor, is active in various community and professional organizations. He is also a trustee of the New Jersey Institute of Local Government Attorneys. Mr. Goodell served as Chair of the Isles Board of Trustees from January 2010 to December 2013.
Ronald B. Stark is an accounting and finance professional who has held executive level positions with several area companies, including NRG Energy, Pegasus Communications, and Berlitz International, and began his career as an auditor with Deloitte & Touche. He most recently served as NRG’s VP, Chief Accounting Officer with responsibility for directing all financial accounting and reporting activities company-wide. Ron is a certified public accountant and received his Bachelor’s degree in Accounting from Hofstra University and his J.D. from Rutgers School of Law in Newark.
Jacquelyn León, MPH is a Program Analyst at the New Jersey Department of Education. In this role, Ms. León works to catalogue “what works” in the area of school preparedness. She provides direct technical assistance and training to equip school administrators with the knowledge and tools to develop a high-quality emergency operations plan and the skills to exercise their plans to assess readiness during an emergency. Prior to joining the Department, Ms. León consulted with various agencies focused on positive youth development. Ms. León is a resident of Trenton.