Five Star Bank Awards First Progress in Action Grant to Provide Ring Video Doorbells to 3 Streets in Northeast Rochester Neighborhood
Rochester, NY—March 12, 2020— Five Star Bank , a regional community bank that offers a wide range of consumer and commercial banking services in 50-plus offices in Western and Central New York, is pleased to announce that the first Progress in Action grant in the amount of $12,500 is being awarded to the Unity Northeast Block Club Association.
The grant will enable the purchase up to 125 Ring Video Doorbells for interested residents on St. Stanislaus, Del Monte and Manchester Streets, between North and Carter Streets. The doorbells will be installed by Action for a Better Community, Inc., for those choosing to participate.
Progress in Action is a unique grassroots initiative launched by Five Star Bank to bring people in the community together to help low-income families in economically vulnerable neighborhoods, one block at a time.
Five Star Bank established the initiative through the United Way and the Rochester Area Community Foundation, who formed a unique partnership and made it possible to give neighbors the opportunity to receive funding for ideas they have to improve the quality of life in their neighborhood. Donations to the United Way have been a combination of contributions from Five Star Bank and from people in the community who have supported Progress in Action with individual donations.
Ring Video Doorbells allow residents to be notified via an app on a mobile device or computer, if there is motion at their door and to communicate with the individual if desired. The Ring program also provides device owners the opportunity to participate in the Ring Neighbors program, which serves as a digital Neighborhood Watch program, alerting neighbors to any suspicious activity the doorbells capture in their neighborhood.
Joe Dugan, Chief Experience and Go to Market Officer for Five Star Bank, who is leading the bank’s Progress in Action initiative, said, “We were impressed by this grant application because it addressed a basic need all community residents deserve, which is to be safe in their own homes.”
The grant request was submitted by Emma Morrison, Unity North East Block Association president, with the intention of making safety in the Northeast neighborhood a priority.
Morrison said, “Our drive is to make the neighborhood a safer and better place to live. By making it possible to purchase these Ring devices, Five Star Bank is giving us the opportunity to make our community safer. This will impact a lot of residents who are elderly, have disabilities, and who don’t feel safe in their homes. Five Star Bank has opened the door to more opportunities to improve our neighborhood through Progress in Action. We are grateful to them for their commitment to the Northeast neighborhood.”
Morrison recognized that while funding the purchase of the Doorbells was one challenge, expecting neighbors to install them was another, so she reached out to Carlos Santana, of Action for a Better Community (ABC), to complete the installations.
“The Progress in Action grant is without parallel in our community,” said Carlos Santana, ABC’s Community Building in Action Program Coordinator. “We are pleased to be collaborating on this project to improve the safety of our neighborhood. We initially asked for 25 devices but Five Star Bank wanted to make an even greater impact in our community and suggested the grant should be able to fund enough devices to install at all the homes on the three-street block. That is 125 homes where residents will feel safe because of a bank that cares for our community and is committed to the greater Rochester safety. We thank Five Star Bank for showing that it cares by its action.”
Morrison and Santana are contacting residents to see if they want a doorbell installed. Installation is targeted to be completed in April.
Police officials say partnerships with Ring are already helping them investigate crimes.
Commander Fabian Rivera of the City of Rochester Police Departmen t said, “Partnerships have been established with police departments around the region to include the Rochester Police Department and Monroe County Sheriff’s Office. Ring cameras and the Neighbors app allow owners of both Ring and non-Ring security systems, or anyone who might have taken a video on a cellphone, to share them online and comment on images, creating an online neighborhood watch.”
Rivera added, “Police personnel can also send a message to the community in a specific region via the app and the community can see if their devices captured anything relevant, which they can choose to share directly with the police department. Reviewing video surveillance footage has been standard procedure for police investigating crimes. These partnerships could expand that reach to include posting information in the app and to help keep their Ring neighbors informed of local issues.”
Dugan said, “Much great work is being done by many community groups and not-for-profits to resolve the significant challenges of poverty and education in the City of Rochester. Progress in Action was designed to supplement that great work by providing folks living in challenged neighborhoods a way to improve the quality of life on their block, while these systemic issues are being addressed. Once the doorbells are installed, we will be monitoring the impact of this grant and how it has produced positive change in this neighborhood.”
More Information
The NE Unity Block Association has been in existence since 2011 and focuses on making a difference with our neighbors regarding health, nutrition, culture, PLAYROC, clean sweep, safety and overall quality of life issues.
Progress in Action Information
For more information on Progress in Action visit: https://uwrochester.org/ProgressInAction .
The grant application process is managed by the Rochester Area Community Foundation. Applications for Progress in Action grants can be made by visiting https://www.racf.org/grant/special-regional-improvement-grants/
The Community Can Also Donate to Progress in Action
Donations may be made directly to the United Way through MobileCause a https://app.mobilecause.com/form/k4n1Ng?vid=5hlr2
Donations collected through the United Way using MobileCause and the text code “ProgressAction” will be restricted funds that will be solely allocated to the Progress in Action initiative.
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Five Star Bank provides a wide range of consumer and commercial banking and lending services to individuals, municipalities, and businesses through a network of more than 50 offices throughout Western and Central New York State.
Additional Five Star Bank information is available at www.five-starbank.com and on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Five Star Bank, SDN Insurance Agency, LLC (“SDN”), Courier Capital, LLC (“Courier Capital”) and HNP Capital, LLC (“HNP Capital”) are subsidiaries of Financial Institutions, Inc. SDN provides a broad range of insurance services to personal and business clients. Courier Capital and HNP Capital provide customized investment management, investment consulting and retirement plan services to individuals, businesses, institutions, foundations and retirement plans. Financial Institutions, Inc. and its subsidiaries employ approximately 700 individuals. Financial Institutions, Inc. stock is listed on the NASDAQ Global Select Market under the symbol FISI. Additional information is available at www.fiiwarsaw.com .