Services Agency Moves North at Critical Time
By Philip Rucker
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Since the Jewish Social Service Agency opened a new headquarters in Rockville this spring, the nonprofit organization said, demand has soared for its mental health, financial assistance and other programs.
The number of mental health sessions provided to families in need has increased by 40 percent, while the number of families applying for financial assistance has increased by 25 percent, said the agency's chief operating officer, Tal Widdes.
Across the Washington region, nonprofit agencies are seeing rising demand for services as the economic downturn and climbing gas prices force many working families to seek help.
"We're seeing a surge in requests for emergency assistance," said Chuck Bean, executive director of the Nonprofit Roundtable of Greater Washington. "It is, of course, related to the pinch at the pump and rising food costs."
The Jewish Social Service Agency also attributes its expanding clientele to its new location in Rockville, which is more accessible to families living in such growing northern Montgomery County suburbs as Germantown and Gaithersburg.
JSSA relocated its headquarters from Montrose Road in the North Bethesda area to the Falls Grove neighborhood of Rockville, near the Interstate 270 corridor. Widdes said the agency was "busting at the seams" at the Montrose Road site.
Last month, officials dedicated the new 31,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art building.
"We had seriously outgrown our facilities, and our staff was spread out in many different locations," Widdes said. "This building allowed us to consolidate, bring our staff together so they could work more closely. We also wanted to move upcounty, where we really see the growth of young children and families. It allows us to better target and serve that population."
JSSA will keep its old building, as well as locations in Silver Spring and Fairfax. The 115-year-old organization serves people of all faiths, specializing in a variety of counseling, vocational and educational services for children, working adults and elderly people. It serves about 15,000 people each year.
The $15 million building was paid for by private donations, as well as about $2 million in public funds from Montgomery County and the state.
Bruce Adams, director of community partnerships in the administration of County Executive Isiah Leggett (D), said nonprofit groups such as JSSA serve an essential role in providing services to residents.
"We couldn't be the county that we are without their support," Adams said. "The government simply can't do it all, particularly in a difficult time like now when people have more needs and we have, as a government, less resources."
Adams said he and Leggett are pleased to see JSSA expand into northern Montgomery, where there are not many social service agencies.
"There's increasing need, particularly in the Germantown area, further and further out as we've grown, but there's less civic infrastructure," Adams said. "You go to a place like Silver Spring, and there's way more nonprofit groups providing a variety of programs to serve people. In Germantown, there is a real concern that we just don't have the civic infrastructure yet."
JSSA's new facility will house expanded programs in autism and couples counseling. The Autism Family Coordination Program provides support for autistic children as well as their parents and siblings, including therapy, social skills classes, monitoring, education and training.
"Unlike many traditional case management programs, the focus is to look not just at the needs of the child, but what kinds of needs do the parents have?" said Jamell White, clinician in charge of the program. "What kinds of parents do the siblings have? We're looking at the whole family, not just the child with autism."
The Collaborating Couples Program provides premarital and marital counseling, support for parents of special-needs children, and specialized counseling for issues such as conflict, decision making, intimacy, religion, finances and parenting.
Widdes said enrollment in these programs is up, partly because of the economy. With the rise in gas prices and other living costs, many families cannot afford to pay out of pocket for private therapy.
"We find that there are families who are struggling economically. They're feeling the pressures of the downturn in the economy, with the cost of living going up," Widdes said. "People are just more stressed, more concerned, more depressed, more worried about how they're going to make ends meet, and that drives them to seek care."
JSSA also provides financial assistance, helping families pay their bills over the short term and putting them on a path toward self-sufficiency, Marketing Director Lise Krantz said.
"We help with everything from not being able to buy groceries to helping to pay rent and other short-term situations," Krantz said.
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