SAN ANTONIO FIGHTING BACK’S MANAGEMENT BOARD OF DIRECTORS

The mission of San Antonio Fighting Back’s (SAFB) Management Board of Directors has been to help create a supportive network of volunteers, neighborhoods and service providers working together collaboratively to change the quality of life for children and families through volunteer power.

Individually they had already accomplished much. One played football in two Super Bowls, but is more proud of his work with youth. Another launched the first bilingual support group for HIV-infected women and helps pediatric AIDS patients, while another works with law enforcement agencies to rid neighborhoods of crime and drugs. Together, the 15-member, all-volunteer group, share a vision of a crime and drug-free community and are working towards that end.

Throughout its five-year history, this nonprofit comprehensive substance abuse, crime and violence prevition, and community improvement and development program of the United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County has enjoyed much success. In the past year alone, they have helped lead the effort in the creation of a Management Information System (MIS) provider-linked system. Unprecedented in Bexar County, this system connects substance abuse prevention, intervention and treatment providers and allows them to share information and eliminate the duplication of services.

They have also led the way for programs that helped create a significant drop in drug-related crime with the SAFB target area. Through the successful efforts of neighborhood mobilization endeavors and substance abuse prevention and intervention program, crime in the target area has dropped a reported 10.3 percent.

Together, they have formed the necessary collaborations needed to maintain the viability of the agency. Collaborations have been created with state and federal agencies, private sector businesses, and community groups. They have hashed out long-term goals and strategic plans to maintain the vision and promise they made when they came together for the first time — the promise of increasing the capacity of communities to solve their own problems and become self-sufficient.

The greatest accomplishment of SAFB’s Management Board of Directors has been to help create a supportive network of volunteers, neighborhoods, and service providers. Since its inception in 1992, SAFB has generated nationally recognized program and more than 1,384 public events. More than 1.6 million individuals have volunteered in one or more of SAFB’s programs in the past five years.