It’s that time of year. United Way of Eastern Maine volunteers are getting ready to review the agencies and decide how to distribute the funds that were raised last fall. At the campaign finale celebration we announced a projected total of $2,589,976, which represents a 3.3 percent increase over last year and will impact member agencies and their clients in countless ways. This was the largest campaign in United Way history.

An accomplishment of this magnitude happens because of the generosity and hard work of many. It happened because of the leadership of campaign chair Deborah Carey Johnson and the outstanding support she received from her employer, Eastern Maine Healthcare.

Much of the success of the overall campaign comes from the Leader’s Circle campaign. We are projecting that donors who give $1,000 or more will provide our efforts with approximately $533,000, which is 21 percent of the overall campaign. It happened because of the many donors and companies who are there for United Way year in and year out. It happened because of the hundreds and hundreds of campaign volunteers whose tireless efforts make a campaign of this magnitude possible.

Finally, it happened because of you and the almost 15,000 other individuals who supported this campaign. It was your generosity and commitment to help people throughout Hancock, Penobscot, Piscataquis, Waldo and Washington counties that made such a success possible.

With your support, we are working to make the communities of eastern Maine stronger and healthier with programs such as Keeping Kids On Track, United Volunteers and infoLine. At our kickoff we announced a new program called “Read For Success,” designed to help children improve their literacy skills and give them a great start in school and life.

We now have 22 workplaces where volunteers are reading to children on a weekly basis and that number is growing daily. We also launched a book drive to collect books for child care centers and children who don’t have books at home. We hoped to collect 500 books. We received 2,458 books. It was a tremendous success. The books have been distributed to 66 child care centers throughout the five county area served by the United Way of Eastern Maine.

So many good things are happening and I am excited about our community building successes. We could not accomplish all that we are doing without you. Thank you.

C. Jeffery Wahlstrom is the executive director of United Way of Eastern Maine.