INCLINE VILLAGE, Nev.— Sierra Community House has released their Peak Impact Report for 2022-2023, highlighting the achievements of the year while celebrating the outstanding contributions from the community. 

Sierra Community House is a non-profit with multiple facets that serve the community, ranging from hunger relief to legal support. Over the past year, the organization has delivered 26,783 services to more than 5,000 community members. 

While that number is impressive in terms of SCH’s ability to serve the community, Director of Operations and Communications Shannon Falker explained that the goal is to provide the same level of service through any situation the community may face. 

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“For us, while this number is really impressive… we know it’s always going to be evolving. During COVID, our hunger relief numbers were through the roof, and we’ve seen them plateau a bit,” said Falker. 

Falker went on to explain that each individual service to a community member is different, and requires a different length of time to support one’s needs. Whether it be receiving and eventually graduating from getting a weekly bag of food, to more in depth help from a legal aide of over the course of several weeks, every person helped gets the same dedication from staff. 

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Although the non-profit is always looking to spread awareness about their services, the goal isn’t necessarily to grow the number of services that will be provided to community members. 

“We’re not inherently looking to grow that number year over year. It will really kind of meet community members and the trends of what they’re experiencing,” said Falker.

Part of the report touches on the three year strategic plan that SCH has implemented in order to build a foundation for the organization for success in the future. Looking back at COVID, Falker noted there was a sharp increase in needs of services, and they’d like to be prepared in case something of the same magnitude were to happen again. 

“We can’t anticipate those types of needs, so I thin we want to build that really strong foundation so that when there are needs in our community that we couldn’t have anticipated, we have a really strong foundation to meet them where they’re at,” said Falker. 

While there are many areas of service that SCH caters to, the children of north shore are kept in mind though every decision, with the Family Room a top priority at Truckee Elementary School. 

“Anyone from the community is welcome,” said Falker. “You can bring children from zero to five years old, and we have child care poviders and folks who have expertise in child development.” 

The room is home to games and actives donated from local community members that are developmentally attuned for different age groups. This free service is helpful of those who can’t afford childcare but want their children to experience the resources made available by the program. 

“It’s just this really incredible physical facility where people can bring their kids in and they can learn. It’s a really powerful educational tool.” 

At the end of each school year, there is a graduation ceremony held for children who will age out of the program. The ceremony is held in English and in Spanish. 

SCH continues their work with children through education at schools, including violence prevention education, to 3,000 children and adults. 

Falker noted that donations from the community, along with government grants, are the primary way that SCH is able to fund their programming. At the end of June 2023, SCH had received over $90,000 in restricted donations and fundraising, and over a million dollars in unrestricted donations and funding. 

Falker explained that restricted donations are ones that are given to specific programs within SCH, whether that be the hunger prevention program or the crisis intervention program. 

Unrestricted donations are donations given to be used at the discretion of SCH. During COVID, unrestricted donations were pivotal in helping community members through the crisis. 

While all donations are welcomed and greatly appreciated by SCH, unrestricted donations are ideal in order to prepare for the worst case scenarios that could possibly come up in the area. 

“Part of our strategic plan is around building out that giving society, and really connecting with our community form a fundraising perspective. We live in this area where there is so much generosity and we have a small town feel where everyone feels connected to their neighbors, and we hope that by getting the word out even further about Sierra Community House and what we do,” said Falker, “that is really motivating for people to consider us as a recipient for their donations.” 

To learn more about Sierra Community House and to see their Peak Impact Report, visit sierracommunityhouse.org.