How Helping Hands Came Together in Worcester During Pandemic

“At the beginning of March, when people were clearing store shelves of food, cleaning supplies and toilet paper, Barbara Fields and Tim Garvin were already working on a way to address the great humanitarian crisis that was quickly brewing throughout Worcester County and beyond.

Fields, president and CEO of the Greater Worcester Community Foundation, and Garvin, president and CEO of United Way of Central Massachusetts, people on their executive boards, and partner nonprofits were closely following the unfolding ominous news accounts about what would soon become the greatest health and economic threat in the country in more than a century.

Between the announcement of the state’s first presumptive positive case of COVID-19 on March 2, and Gov. Charlie Baker’s decision to close nonessential businesses on March 23 to suppress the spread of the deadly virus, leaders of the two venerable service organizations were well on their way to reaching out to hundreds of nonprofit partners and dependable veteran donors about raising money to provide assistance to the thousands of vulnerable people in the county who would be greatly impacted.”