Letter from REACH

President of the Board and Executive Director

Dear Friends,

Welcome to REACH’s new and improved website. We’re glad you came to visit.

Today, the role REACH plays in our community is significantly different than when we began over 24 years ago. Our mission has extended far beyond our successful hotline service, to become much more of a catalyst in creating strong, healthy families and communities by offering safe housing, shelter and vital services to women, men, children and families who have experienced domestic violence. 

REACH has completed an extensive internal evaluation and done a great deal of research to get where we are today.  Changing demographics and escalating domestic violence trends combined with policy and funding changes made by government mean that we constantly need to find new ways to address prevailing domestic violence issues and the resulting needs in our communities. We are deeply committed to listening to community - to survivors, to contributors, to supporters in business and to other service providers in order to make responsive and informed programmatic decisions. Our strategic plan is based on the priority issues that we have been able to identify as being important to the long-term health and well-being of our organization.

We have adopted some very simple guidelines to help us focus on what matters. As we look to the future:

• We must be vigilant about addressing root causes of domestic violence and those conditions that promote fear, isolation and homelessness.
• We must bring together all of the different sectors to address what matters to all of us;
• We must adapt preventive approaches and activities that promote the building and strengthening of familial and community relationships;
• We need to help to promote stability in times of social and funding changes;
• We need to promote opportunities for learning and sharing best practices;
• And we need to work together to engage others in our work.

We are very pleased to be a part of REACH, and we want to assure you that REACH will continue to do what matters –to work to eradicate domestic violence and improve the well-being of people in our communities.

On behalf of the Board of Directors, the staff, the hundreds of volunteers and the thousands of people throughout the Greater Boston area who benefit from our services, we want to say thank you for your commitment and your generous contributions to REACH.

We hope you enjoy our website and find it useful. To those of you who are new to the REACH family, we invite you to join the courageous battle to help us reach beyond domestic violence.

Sincerely,

Chris Konys	Laura Van Zandt
Board of Directors	Executive Director