Clark College and YWCA Clark County announced they are discontinuing their annual “Women of Achievement” program after 26 years.
“It’s unfortunate, but we’re really having to scale back,” Clark College President Bob Knight said. “Both organizations reluctantly agreed to step away from this.”
“To say we deliberated quite awhile is an understatement,” said Kathy Kniep, executive director of YWCA Clark County.
o In its 26 years, 310 people were honored through the “Women of Achievement” event and its affiliated “Young Women of Achievement” program.
The decision is a reflection of economic conditions that combined to spread resources much thinner for both organizations.
According to a joint news release, “It has become increasingly clear that the event, as it is currently structured, is no longer viable in terms of the cost and the resources provided by each organization. The needs in our region are great, and both organizations are facing increased demands.”
“Money was more of an issue for the YWCA,” Knight said. “We used a lot of staff hours working on the whole process. We have to be efficient with our resources.”
The YWCA isn’t releasing specific financial information, but the annual event “was costing our organization a fair amount of money,” Kniep said Wednesday. “We need to focus on our core missions and programs.”
Still, “This event was one way we fulfilled our mission, to empower women,” Kniep said.
In the news release, the two organizations noted that “it is vital that YWCA Clark County be able to focus on providing needed services. As a result, the YWCA is working harder than ever to solicit funding to make that possible. At the same time, Clark College is dealing with record student enrollments during a time of substantial state budget cuts.”
Turning the event into a fundraiser for YWCA Clark County would require boosting ticket prices out of the range of many past award winners and YWCA supporters, according to the release.
The timetable of the annual event illustrates the effort involved. It’s typically in March, in conjunction with Women’s History Month, Kniep said. But if they had scheduled a 2011 event, all the preliminary work — such as seeking nominations — would have had to begin soon.
The Clark College-YWCA collaboration “was a wonderful partnership, and we plan to work together in the future,” Kniep said. The event also highlighted an interesting range of community contributors, Kniep said.
“Many honorees were well recognized as community leaders,” she said. “Other honorees who do incredible work are not as well known in the community, and they got the recognition they deserved.”
Tom Vogt: 360-735-4558 or tom.vogt@columbian.com.
