The San Clemente Military Family Outreach provides emergency assistance to military families, especially Marine and Navy families in the north-San Onofre end of Camp Pendleton. We primarily assist E7 and below families on Camp Pendleton, because 10% of these families are paid a military salary below the poverty line. The rest have an income that makes it difficult to plan for “a rainy day”, and often the spouse is unable to find work because the family moves so often. We aim to faithfully serve the young families who sacrifice so much for us all. Our #1 goal is to respond to the day-to-day requests for emergency assistance - diapers, food, clothing, gas, car repairs, health and dental expenses, and other unexpected financial challenges.

Families in crisis find a safety net in SCMFO. A low-key, one-on-one interview with our office team begins a pathway to resolution of the crisis. We specifically assist with extraordinary needs that pose a threat to the family’s financial welfare – for example, a pediatric dental bill that the family cannot afford. Another example would be a family that is out of cash just before the next pay period – we would offer this family food from our pantry, diapers if there are infants in the house, and gas cards, so that the service member can continue to get to work. We also conduct morale events, which helps us to spread the word on base about our services. Many of our volunteers have served on active duty, share a strong bond with the families, and seize any and every opportunity to lift the spirits of spouses and families.

SCMFO has been working with military families on Camp Pendleton since 2002. As an all-volunteer organization, not one penny of donations pays a salary to our team or to our Board of Directors. We work to minimize all administrative, fundraising and operating costs – because we know that every dollar we spend on overhead is a dollar that we can’t use to serve a military family in need. In 2018, a mere 5.8% of our expenses went to operating costs and fundraising combined, and 94.2% of our expenses directly supported military families with emergency health, food, transportation and child-related costs.

At SCMFO, we believe that “Success is helping one family at a time.” Service members put their life on the line, leave their family and friends, and deploy to all parts of the world to protect their fellow Americans… and in their moment of need, we must be there to support them back. Success is ensuring the family of a deployed service member doesn’t ride in an unsafe vehicle. Success is telling a mother that we can help pay for the medical procedure her sick child desperately needs. Success is giving bags of groceries from our food pantry to a military family that was in danger of going hungry. Success is saying “yes” when qualified military families come to us in genuine need.

Annually we assist 150-200 families experiencing a financial crisis. Unfortunately, in 2018, incoming donations only equaled 75% of the aid and support SCMFO provided to military families. We were able to continue the required level of aid due to a one-time estate donation from a generous supporter, which sustained our mission. If we don’t increase our donations, however, we’ll have to scale back our assistance to Annually, we assist 150-200 families experiencing a financial crisis. Unfortunately, in 2018, incoming deserving families. Next, we’ll refocus our fundraising efforts so that incoming donations match the needs of families. Annually, we reach more than 2000 families through our morale events. We are best known for our annual “Turkey Giveaway” each November, to approximately 1000 families. We hold an annual baby shower for military moms-to-be, like their family would have done at home. And we enthusiastically respond to all requests from the elementary school where children of our service members are educated – we consider it an accomplishment that the Vice Principal calls us when the students are in need. We’ve already started to scale back on morale events and will continue to do so if we are not able to jump start our fundraising efforts. Achieving the GuideStar Gold Seal of Transparency will help our community have confidence in their donations, so that we can continue our support for the welfare and morale of military families on Camp Pendleton. Thank you for your consideration.