Operation Homefront, Inc
Serving America's Military Families
Learn how to support this organization
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Operation Homefront, a nationally recognized 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, builds strong, stable, and secure military families so they can thrive, not simply struggle to get by, in the communities - OUR communities - they have worked so hard to protect. We help military families through a variety of financial challenges by providing impactful programs designed to ensure that short-term needs do not turn into long-term struggles that derail any hope for a brighter future. Our programs focus on: RELIEF through critical financial assistance and transitional and permanent housing programs; RECURRING FAMILY SUPPORT during financially stressful periods throughout the year.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Critical Financial Assistance Program
Operation Homefronts Critical Financial Assistance program helps military and veteran families address financial shortfalls. Most often, this means assistance with mortgage, rent, utilities, car and home repairs, overdue bills, critical baby items, and groceries. Since 2011, Operation Homefront has provided over $41 million in assistance to military and veteran families.
Our process is managed by professional caseworkers who validate financial needs before support is provided. Assistance is in the form of grants, not loans, and paid directly to service providers, not the family. Through our nonprofit partners, those receiving financial assistance with rent, mortgage, utilities, and food are provided with financial education to help them achieve long-term self-sustainability.
Eligibility includes service members ranks E1-E6 with legal dependents and still actively serving, post-9/11 wounded, ill, or injured service members and veterans with medical documentation on an injury.
Operation Homefront Villages (Transitional Housing Program)
Operation Homefront Villages provides rent-free transitional housing to wounded warriors leaving the military. They are designed to enable military families to heal together while bridging the gap between when military pay stops and veteran benefits begin.
Veterans disability claims can take up to two years to be reviewed, meanwhile, families already facing the challenges of lengthy and complex recovery and rehabilitation processes are further stressed by daunting financial burdens. Our Villages relieve financial stress and provide a comprehensive package of individualized family support and financial planning services.
Each participating family is provided with:
- Rent-free, utility-free, fully furnished apartment
- Case management and customized transition plans
- One-on-one financial planning
- Employment coaching
- Medical referrals
- Support network
Operation Homefront has three Villages with 30 apartments located in Gaithersburg, MD; San Diego, CA; and San Antonio, TX.
Permanent Homes for Veterans
Operation Homefronts Permanent Homes for Veterans (PHV) program with the assistance of our corporate partners awards mortgage-free homes and provides supportive services to our nation's veterans and military families.
How it works:
Step 1: Veterans and military families go to my.operationhomefront.org and complete the application.
Step 2: Operation Homefront reviews the applications and selects a recipient.
Step 3: The selected family resides in the home as a tenant for 2 years.
Step 4: Home is deeded mortgage-free to families completing the program.
Operation Homefront's financial contributions include supportive services, case management, and home repairs. The recipients financial contributions include property taxes, HOA fees, and the home warranty.
Operation Homefront provides one-on-one homeowner counseling services including debt reduction, emergency savings, credit score improvement, homeownership guidance, and community integration.
Recurring Family Support
Operation Homefront provides recurring family support services through a variety of programs to ensure that short-term needs dont turn into chronic long-term struggles.
Back-To-School Brigade provides military children with backpacks stuffed with supplies, relieving families of this cost and enabling them to use their income for other household expenses.
Holiday Meals for Military primarily helps military families by providing them with fixings for a traditional holiday meal.
Holiday Toy Drive brings the joy of the holiday season to military kids helping to relieve the financial burden many service members and their families face during the holidays.
Our Star-Spangled Babies program provides baby showers to expecting service members and their growing families. The showers provide these new and expecting parents with early childhood education tips and a support system when loved ones are far away.
Where we work
Awards
4-Star Rating 2018
Charity Navigator
Platinum Seal of Transparency 2018
GuideStar.org
3-Star Rating 2019
Charity Navigator
Platinum Seal of Transparency 2019
GuideStar.org
3-Star Rating 2020
Charity Navigator
Platinum Seal of Transparency 2020
Candid. GuideStar
4-Star Rating 2021
Charity Navigator
Platinum Seal of Transparency 2021
Candid. GuideStar
Platinum Seal of Transparency 2022
Candid.GuideStar
Affiliations & memberships
Association of Fundraising Professionals - Member 2013
Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance - Organization 2013
Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance - Organization 2014
Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance - Organization 2015
Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance - Organization 2016
Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance - Organization 2017
Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance - Organization 2018
Better Business Wise Giving Alliance - Organization 2020
External reviews
Videos
Our results
How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.
Number of military families seeking critical financial assistance (since 2011)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Critical Financial Assistance Program
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Since 2011, nearly 49,000 military families have sought critical financial assistance from Operation Homefront.
Number of military families provided with financial assistance (since 2011)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Critical Financial Assistance Program
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Since 2011, Operation Homefront has provided over 21,000 military families with critical financial assistance in their time of need.
Total dollar value of critical financial assistance provided to military families (since 2011)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
Since 2011, Operation Homefront has provided military & veteran families with critical assistance valued at over $37.2 million.
Number of military families housed in OH Transitional Housing Villages (since 2008)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Operation Homefront Villages (Transitional Housing Program)
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Since the program's inception, OH's Transitional Villages has sheltered over 730 unique families, benefiting over 2,500 individual military family members.
Total dollar value of defrayed rental and utility costs to military families housed in OH Transitional Housing Villages properties (since 2008)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Operation Homefront Villages (Transitional Housing Program)
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Since 2008, OH's Transitional Housing program has defrayed over $8M dollars in rental & utility costs for military families medically separating from service.
Number of military families placed in homes through OH's permanent home donation program, Permanent Homes for Veterans (since 2012)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Permanent Homes for Veterans
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Decreasing
Context Notes
Since 2012, Operation Homefront has placed over 700 military families into mortgage-free homes across the nation.
Number of mortgage-free Permanent Homes for Veterans properties deeded to military families (since 2012)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Permanent Homes for Veterans
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Since 2012, Operation Homefront has deeded 685 single-family, mortgage-free homes to military & veteran families.
Total dollar value of home equity donated to military families through the Permanent Homes for Veterans program (since 2012)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Permanent Homes for Veterans
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Through Permanent Homes for Veterans, Operation Homefront has provided over $103M in mortgage-free home equity to military and veteran families.
Number of backpacks with school supplies distributed to military children (since 2008)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Children and youth, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Recurring Family Support
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Operation Homefront has provided over 550,000 backpacks and school supply "bundles" to military and veteran children, easing the financial burden of preparing for the school year.
Number of holiday meals provided to military families (since 2010)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Recurring Family Support
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
Since 2010, Operation Homefront has provided nearly 190,000 holiday meals to military and veteran families.
Number of individual military family members provided meals through OH's Holiday Meals for Military program (since 2010)
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Families, Military personnel, Veterans
Related Program
Recurring Family Support
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Holding steady
Context Notes
With each holiday meal serving an average of 4.2 family members, Operation Homefront has provided holiday meals to over 750,000 military family members since 2010.
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
By providing a variety of valuable relief and recurring support programs, Operation Homefront builds strong, stable, and secure military families so they can thrive, not simply struggle to get by, in the communities - our communities - they have worked so hard to protect.
We seek to serve military and veteran families with post-9/11 service, specifically: (1) Active Enlisted (primarily E1-E6) which includes National Guard and Reserves, (2) veterans and their families, as well as (3) wounded, ill, and injured service members/veterans, and (4) their caregivers and families.
We aspire to become the provider of choice for military families seeking short-term, critical assistance, or long-term stability and family support, so that short-term needs do not result in a continuous cycle of hardship that threatens their ability to integrate successfully into their civilian communities.
By connecting the American donor community (individuals, foundations and corporations) to our military families, Operation Homefront is able to help military families overcome many of the challenges they face while they are actively serving, as they transition out of the military, and after their military service.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
A successful strategy connects ways" and programmatic means" with desired ends." For Operation Homefront, our desired end is strong, stable and secure military families. To do so, we provide Relief through our critical financial assistance and transitional housing (Transitional Homes for Veterans & Transitional Housing (Villages and our permanent housing (Permanent Homes for Veterans) programs; and deliver Recurring Family Support through our Holiday Meals for Military, Back to School Brigade, Star-Spangled Babies baby showers and other seasonal programs.
By placing a priority on delivering meaningful outcomes and continuous improvement, we collect, monitor, and assess performance measures designed to track our progress and identify areas for improvement. Our logic model utilizes a framework that evaluates how our inputs, activities, and outputs contribute to program effectiveness in terms of outcomes and impact.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Operation Homefront currently provides services to military families across the nation with 20 field offices serving all 50 states. Our staff consists of more than 135 professionals, of whom 86% have served in the military or have a family connection to the military. Our team currently includes a staff of 27 trained caseworkers who provide personalized support to military families.
Our 4,000+ volunteers support our mission and make it possible to deliver our programs more broadly. 21 National Board members and 61 Regional Advisory Board members extend our reach into local communities.
When working with our military families, we often find they have needs well beyond what any one nonprofit can meet. For that reason, we take an active approach to collaboration with corporate partnerships, foundations and other organizations to help broaden the impact of all of our efforts.
Understanding the need to make the most out of every donation dollar, we place a priority on organizational efficiency. With 85% of our expenditures going toward program delivery, we have earned a 4-star rating with Charity Navigator. We have also met all 20 Standards for Charity Accountability of the Better Business Bureau Wise Giving Alliance.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
We aspire to become the provider of choice for short-term and critical assistance, long-term stability and recurring family support programs for military families. The need for our support is great and we expect it will continue to grow in the foreseeable future. Through our close connection with military families and the military community, we are able to provide a range of supportive and impactful programs, while simultaneously adapting to a constantly changing environment.
With a priority on being a data driven organization, we collect, monitor, and assess performance measures focused on client outcomes and impact. We evaluate program effectiveness based on how our inputs, activities, and outputs contribute to those outcomes and impact. We survey families who participate in programs to assess whether the program helped to make their families more strong, stable and secure. Those results tell the real story – we are generating meaningful client outcomes in-line with our mission goals.
In 2016, a dramatic increase in financial assistance applications from military families in need outpaced our ability to provide support. In response, we revised our application process to deal effectively with changes in a fiscally constrained environment. Our new system allows us to meet as many needs each month as our budget permits, and ensure the program's viability for the future. With an eye on budget conscious decision-making, changes like this allow us to meet the needs of military families in the most effective and efficient way possible, while building financial stability to accommodate future growth.
How we listen
Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.
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How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?
To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To identify where we are less inclusive or equitable across demographic groups, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals
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Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?
We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We aim to collect feedback from as many people we serve as possible, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive, We tell the people who gave us feedback how we acted on their feedback
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What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?
It is difficult to get the people we serve to respond to requests for feedback, It is difficult to identify actionable feedback
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Operation Homefront, Inc
Board of directorsas of 01/12/2024
Uli Correa
Greg Ham
Ken Slater
Tremont Partners, LLC
Tyrone (Woody) Woodyard
Sikorsky, a Lockheed Martin Company
JK Huey
Retired
Dianna Purvis Jaffin
Science and Resilience Adviser
Rod Essig
Music Agent, Creative Artists
Derek Blake
TaxAct
Faith Arnold Swartz
CEO, Housing Finance Strategies, LLC
John Pray
President and CEO, Operation Homefront
Kelly MayHall
President and CEO,
Seth Ellison
Former Levi Strauss C-Suite Executive
Melissa Hathaway
President of Hathaway Global Strategies LLC
Emily Williams Knight
President and CEO, Texas Restaurant Association
Angelo Lombardi
President, Sentia Wellness
Steven G. Mahon
Former EVP, General Counsel & Corporate Secretary, SAIC
Terry Smith
CEO Rushmore Loan Management Services, LLC
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
Gender identity
Transgender Identity
Sexual orientation
Disability
Equity strategies
Last updated: 06/29/2023GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We review compensation data across the organization (and by staff levels) to identify disparities by race.
- We ask team members to identify racial disparities in their programs and / or portfolios.
- We analyze disaggregated data and root causes of race disparities that impact the organization's programs, portfolios, and the populations served.
- We disaggregate data to adjust programming goals to keep pace with changing needs of the communities we support.
- We disaggregate data by demographics, including race, in every policy and program measured.
- We have a promotion process that anticipates and mitigates implicit and explicit biases about people of color serving in leadership positions.
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.
- We have community representation at the board level, either on the board itself or through a community advisory board.
- We measure and then disaggregate job satisfaction and retention data by race, function, level, and/or team.
- We engage everyone, from the board to staff levels of the organization, in race equity work and ensure that individuals understand their roles in creating culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.