PROVIDENCE – The United Way of Rhode Island today announced it has sold its East Side headquarters and will relocate to Olneyville, where President and CEO Anthony Maione said the nonprofit can spur positive change in the community.
“We’re trying to be more relevant, more up-to-date and more involved,” Maione said yesterday in an interview with Providence Business News. “So for us, relocating to a neighborhood that is redeveloping, that does have needs in it that align with our core issues – we thought that would be not only symbolic but on-the-ground helpful.”
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The East Side building – a 2,000-square-foot, three-story building at 229 Waterman St. – has been the United Way’s headquarters since the 1970s, when it was donated by the former Factory Mutual Insurance, one of the companies that later combined to form now FM Global.
Now, the United Way says, the property has been sold to R.I. Acquisitions LLC for $4.375 million.
By June of this year, the 52 employees of United Way of Rhode Island will have moved to Calender Mills, a mixed-use development now being completed by Baltimore-based Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse Inc. The 50 Valley St. office will be “state of the art,” Maione said.
And United Way 211 – the statewide information and referral hotline – will eventually move from its current office at Crossroads Rhode Island to the new Valley Street office. That move is part of United Way’s strategic plan, Maione said.
“About five years ago, United Way made a strategic decision to try to be a catalyst for community change around a few social issues,” including affordable housing and job-skills development, he said.
For the state’s fifth-largest nonprofit by revenue, “it’s a shift, in a way, to try being an agent of change – someone who’s getting results in the community – not just a pass-through for our donors to give their dollars to their favorite charities.”
Maione said community agencies, including the Olneyville Housing Corporation, are welcoming the agency to the neighborhood.
Frank Shea, executive director of the OHC, said in a statement: “Having United Way as a neighbor, in addition to a partner, can only benefit Olneyville residents.”
The United Way of Rhode Island, a nonprofit that traces its roots back to the 1926 founding of the Providence Community Fund, is dedicated to mobilizing the caring power of the community to improve the lives of people in need. It is a member of the HousingWorks RI affordable-housing coalition. For additional information, visit www.uwri.org.
