Dedicated, caring, committed and always willing to lend a hand. These are the excellent descriptors of Snowfest committee member Amy Welch. Another? Lots of fun

CASA just held its 21^st annual Snowfest at Loon Mountain and despite the wild weather, the event was a huge success due in large part to Amy’s efforts.

Amy first came to volunteer with CASA in 2013 because she was ready to get involved in her community. She learned of CASA during a presentation at work and after speaking with friends and coming to understand its mission, she first volunteered on the marketing and communications committee before shifting to events, specifically Snowfest.

“It’s so funny that Snowfest is the event I chose because I hate the cold!” Amy says.

Though she doesn’t ski, Amy spends the day at Snowfest helping with registration, raffle sales and pitching in wherever she can in the Governor’s Pavilion. Being there is fun because she loves being part of the excitement of the day and being able to celebrate our advocates for all they do.

Her participation in Snowfest goes beyond day-of duties. For the last couple years Amy has driven the event’s incredible raffle, and she has used her marketing skills to assist with developing new materials to help spread the word about Snowfest, among numerous other roles she has taken on to help make the event a success.

She landed as a Snowfest committee volunteer because she says one naturally gravitates to what they’re comfortable with and good at.  As a senior manager at wedü, a digital marketing agency in Manchester, Amy wanted to use her skills to help build an event that shows our advocates that not only CASA supports them and the important work they’re doing, but so does the community around them.  Event planning and organizing was the perfect fit.

“These kids are so fortunate to have a CASA as part of their lives.  We do what we can to support and celebrate (CASA volunteer advocates) at Snowfest, but they deserve so much more!”

What Amy says she loves most about volunteering with CASA is how deeply committed everyone associated with the organization is, whether a CASA volunteer advocate, a committee volunteer, board member or employee.

When she was doing her research, Amy was particularly impressed with CASA’s low administrative overhead and how people spoke about CASA with such pride.

“Even with just people I meet around town, everyone who knows CASA is so enthusiastically supportive and proud of the organization,” Amy says. “How can you not want to be a part of that positive energy?”

Tammy O’Neil is a passionate advocate for CASA’s mission as a volunteer advocate and, along with her husband Mike, has been a generous supporter and friend.

Tammy is fairly new to CASA, having completed training in spring of 2018. She heard about CASA through an attorney friend working with guardians ad litem, and discovered that even a lay person could volunteer as a GAL through volunteering with the CASA program. After working in the medical field for 20 years, she moved to the Seacoast and was later married. She eventually cut back to part time and continues to consult for her husbands company. Although the career change was interesting, she realized she accomplished some key initiatives as a consultant, and she “desperately needed something to feed her soul again.”

“I missed being involved in the bigger picture and making a positive difference in another human being’s life,” Tammy says. Through CASA, she found she could make a significant impact in a child’s life, without having to make a big time commitment.”

During her training, Tammy was introduced to the scope of the substance misuse crisis, not realizing, she admits, “the magnitude of the drug epidemic.” After training, Tammy took on a case in the fall of 2018.

“Children in particular are in greatest need of advocates when their parents are unable to see the trees through the forest – when they are struggling with their own difficult time,” Tammy says.

In her current case, she knows it is not due to a lack of love that there is a CASA involved, but that life can get out of control for good people, and life’s circumstances can become a tremendous burden.

“With the right support and resources, these circumstances can change,” Tammy says. “People can get wrapped up in their problems and they forget to look at real life issues. I am not judgmental, and I can say objectively that good people can and do make mistakes.”

Tammy understands first-hand how one person can make a tremendous impact in someone’s life, and has continued to pay it forward beginning with her career in healthcare many years ago.

“It was when I had my daughter and was feeling completely helpless on bedrest for four months that I realized the impact one kind person could have on my day — my life.”

In addition to her volunteer advocacy for children, she and Mike have been ardent financial supporters of CASA, attending CASA Cares for several years and participating in both the live auction and appeal. Tammy also served on the CASA Cares committee, lending her advice to auction efforts. Tammy knows how important it is for children to have a voice.

“I believe that society, particularly those with the ability to articulate and with the fortitude to advocate for the rights of those at a disadvantage, are obligated to do so,” Tammy says. Not everyone has grown up with the same opportunities available to them and we all have intrinsic differences and capacities to handle strife. I know that even the best people sometimes make poor decisions regarding their children. For some people, just getting out of their own way to help themselves is next to impossible.”

Nancy Phillips’ generosity of spirit is a true gift to CASA of New Hampshire and the children we serve. For many years, in addition to leading a very successful business in the auto industry, Nancy has provided both volunteer and financial support to mission-critical children’s organizations like CASA.

Reading a newspaper article about CASA in the early 90s, Nancy was shocked to learn about the need for such an organization, and she was moved to become a volunteer advocate. Nancy’s experience as a volunteer was life-changing as she dedicated her time advocating for the future of a 4-year-old boy who had been severely abused and then abandoned. Through her efforts, the child’s horror ended with adoption into a wonderful family. The case lasted a lengthy 4 years, but, as Nancy notes, it taught her so much about the need for CASA.

“I will never forget it,” she said.

Nancy is proud of the fact that the little boy who struggled so much early in life is now a high-ranking marine. Her time as a volunteer and the importance of CASA continued to resonate deeply after the end of the case. She became a CASA board member and continued to volunteer tirelessly for numerous child-focused nonprofits.

Nancy’s energy is boundless. She balances a very successful career with her love for helping children. She is the founder and principal of Nancy Phillips Associates, Inc., brokering the sale of franchised automobile dealerships throughout the Northeast.  She and her husband Elliot Berkowitz also own a real estate development company on the Seacoast, and together they have a daughter Alexandra.

Nancy’s concern for the welfare of children is long-standing. As Nancy notes, she grew up in a typical middle-class family in Goffstown “without a lot of trauma” and became involved in working with at-risk children while a student at the University of New Hampshire. At UNH she served as an Upward Bound Counselor alongside troubled youth, and became entrenched in various social issues. Throughout college Nancy worked in the Department of Resource Economics researching poverty in New Hampshire and as a tutor in under-served communities before taking her first job for the Dept of Welfare in Oregon. The experience was impactful as Nancy struggled with the dichotomy between their situation and her own experiences and upbringing.

After returning to New Hampshire and starting her own business in the auto industry, Nancy joined forces with Paul Holloway to found the New Hampshire Automobile Dealer Association’s Charitable Foundation. The Foundation funded and administered a program of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children called Kids and Company: Together for Safety in over half of all public and private elementary schools in the state. The program trained hundreds of teachers, social workers and police officers annually and ran for 8 years.

In 2005, she and her husband orchestrated the construction of the first phase of a summer camp in New Hampshire for The Circle Program for at-risk girls between the ages of 9 and 13.

More recently, Nancy launched her own campaign to bring awareness to the crisis of youth homelessness in our state by producing the independent documentary film 404 Not Found with the help and support of Waypoint (formerly Child and Family Services).  The film depicts the extraordinarily difficult lives of young people ages 12 to 24 who couch surf, live in the woods and in cars with no place to call home and no one to care for them. The film was selected as a feature in film festivals in New England and continues to be screened to groups working towards addressing the needs of our homeless youth.   She also founded  EXETER AREA SCHOLARSHIPS  The Different Fund to provide funding for students from difficult home situations who wish to attend any form of secondary schooling or training.

In addition to her volunteer work, Nancy is a very generous contributor to CASA. In 2016, she founded Cars for CASA, a partnership of automobile industry colleagues who have financially supported CASA’s largest fundraising event, CASA Cares. Cars for CASA includes Robert MacDonald of Bernstein Shur Sawyer & Nelson, Sheree Kaplan of Milford Subaru, Dennis Gaudet of AutoServ and Dan Enxing of Volvo Cars of Exeter.  The group has donated thousands of dollars to CASA over the last several years, and generated significant awareness for CASA’s mission. Last year, Cars for CASA became Cars for Causes as Nancy and her team participated in the Child and Family Services Sleep OUT for which they were deemed the second most successful fundraisers.

This May, Cars for CASA is once again a sponsor for CASA Cares and the group has generously donated it’s tickets to Volunteer Advocates who have served CASA for 20 or more years.

CASA is deeply grateful to Nancy and Cars for CASA for their commitment to the children of New Hampshire.

“CASA means so much to me. CASA has changed the lives of all of the children it serves and has literally saved the lives of many.  Without CASA we would have far more sadness, untapped human potential, tragedy and loss in our state than we do today.  As we face more and more difficult family situations, CASA must have more volunteers to enter into one on one relationships with the many abused and neglected children and youth who desperately need help them and who, in return, will give back the greatest gift of all – the opportunity to make better the trajectory of that child’s life.”

Charlie and Jaye Goodwin have been part of CASA’s community of friends and supporters for more than 15 years. Their commitment to transforming the lives of vulnerable children stems from an empathic understanding that there are those who have not benefitted from the same support system they experienced as children. They also recognize the importance of providing hope for a successful future for NH’s children. Charlie notes, “These children have lived difficult lives. We are ensuring there is enough interest and support to give them much more of a chance than they would have otherwise.”

For many years, members of the Goodwin family have served as esteemed community and business leaders in Greater Manchester. Before his retirement in 2005, Charlie operated his family’s long-standing funeral home, Goodwin Funeral Home, carrying forward its legacy of personal and professional philanthropy and volunteer support. Charlie became more familiar with CASA during his tenure in funeral service when he served a family who had adopted a CASA child who later passed away. This experience was, according to Charlie, “moving and informative.”

“They were an incredible, supportive family; CASA advocates who had adopted three children,” he says.

His introduction to CASA also reinforced the thought that not everyone had the same access to a loving, stable home life.

“Both Jaye and I had safe and secure upbringings and we were also able to provide that same environment for our children,” Charlie says.

Charlie and Jaye’s parents were both involved in a variety of causes. According to Charlie, his own parents, Dorothy and David Goodwin, “Instilled in my sisters and I that our business relied on the community and we should be supportive of that community.”

In 2005, when he retired, CASA CEO and President Marty Sink approached Charlie about serving on the board. The timing was right, says Charlie and he served on the board for eight years and continues to serve on the Finance Committee.

Charlie and Jaye understand the value and impact that CASA volunteer advocates provide during these challenging times, and their generosity speaks to their passion.

“We care about the community,” Charlie says. “We care about providing a good future for children. It’s what everyone wants. We are deeply concerned about the impact of the opioid crisis on the children of New Hampshire.”

He and Jaye also know that many of the children served by our volunteer advocates may not have role models in their lives, and they appreciate the consistent example that CASA volunteer advocates set.

The Goodwins have great regard for CASA’s mission and the depth of support services the organization provides, Charlie says, noting that CASA meets a unique need unlike any other non-profit in New Hampshire.

“When we see a child being abused, everyone thinks someone should do something — and CASA does do something. CASA has so many success stories. We have saved hundreds of children from horrible situations,” Charlie says.