Leading with Purpose - Jan Lepore-Jentleson (June 2023)

JAN LEPOREJENTLESON

Jan Lepore-Jentleson is the current and founding executive director of WestCare Ohio, doing business as East End Community Services (EECS) Her primary responsibilities are managing operations and raising funds for her non-profit on Xenia Avenue in the heart of the inner East Dayton neighborhood locally known as the “Twin Towers,” so named for the beautiful Catholic church St Mary’s, which stands tall with two stately towers

Twin Towers has always been a strong working-class neighborhood, but like many Rust Belt cities, it was hit hard by global economics and the Great Recession that began in 2007 EECS (or simply “East End”) heavily relies on federal grants, community partnerships, and private donations to offer dozens of programs and services for children and families to break the cycle of generational poverty through education, family support, and the redevelopment of urban neighborhoods

In addition to her role with WestCare Ohio, Jan is a member of President Dick Steinberg’s Senior Service Advisors team for WestCare Foundation Jan noted, "I think I was asked to be part of that group because I bring a unique perspective due to our neighborhoodbased approach. We leverage strong community relationships to impact the conditions that set people up for failure and strive to reverse those conditions and set people up for success. Dick and our CEO, Ken Ortbals, are interested in deepening community relationships for all WestCare entities. I have been doing that in Dayton my entire career. I want to help other WestCare leaders do the same."

Jan received her undergraduate degree at the University of Dayton in Ohio, where she was immersed in programs centered around community building and servant leadership. Her educational experiences primed her for a professional career building supportive, caring communities Following graduation, Jan went to the Dayton city government to direct the Horizons '76 project with teams composed of city and county officials, business leaders, community members, and faculty and students from the University of Dayton. These sessions –coinciding with our nation’s bicentennial celebration in 1976 – envisioned what Dayton could look like 25 years later at the beginning of a new millennium

Following that experience, Jan entered the private sector and became a product manager and planner for NCR Corporation, headquartered in Dayton. After eight years, she felt the calling to return to government, so she accepted an opportunity with Dayton City Hall and served as manager for the Department of Neighborhood Development, which included housing inspection, zoning, building inspection, and plan review. While overseeing 90 staff, Jan learned a great deal about management, and over 13 years, she worked to reinvent the department to make it work better for Dayton's neighborhoods and families. Recalling one afternoon in 1997 when she was discouraged, Jan says, "I remember deciding that I was fed up wasting my time being a bureaucrat, pushing paper and accomplishing little value for the people living in Dayton’s poorest neighborhoods."

So, Jan decided to quit her job and go out into one of the more distressed neighborhoods in East Dayton and start a new non-profit community development organization to address poverty issues and spur change. East End opened its doors in 1998 to revitalize the city’s Twin Towers neighborhood and break generational poverty cycles. From the beginning, the primary focus has been on children, with programs focusing on accessing quality education, after-school programs, and youth development.

After about twenty years into that journey, Dayton was in the thick of the opioid epidemic. EECS was working with police and support services to get people into treatment in an era before Medicaid expansion and when there weren’t many providers. Jan says, "People were dropping dead in our community daily. Kids from our after-school programs went home, finding their parents dead in their bathtubs. It was tragic."

To make matters worse, East End (like many other nonprofits) was having significant financial challenges and was considering eliminating employee benefits to keep the doors open. Jan knew that if they did that, they wouldn't be able to hire competent, dedicated people to meet the community's needs “It was probably the worst period I've ever experienced professionally,” Jan said

But as fate would have it, Jan met Dick Steinberg when he was in Dayton, and they started talking about a possible merger Jan says, "One thing led to another, and we joined WestCare officially on July 1, 2017, and legally became WestCare Ohio. However, we are still known and operating as East End Community Services because we now have a 25-year history as that organization."

It's been quite a journey, but as Jan contemplates retirement, she still has one big project to do before she leaves the organization she founded: building a new $6M facility and moving the East Dayton community toward a whole-family approach to wellbeing Jan shares, "Unlike some WestCare organizations, East End does community development and education and looks at our community's five social determinants of health to see the service gaps."

Among those service offerings is a unique partnership with Dayton's Ruskin Elementary School Children enrolled in East End’s Miracle Makers program spend 90 minutes every day after school working on homework, then 90 minutes doing activities like learning to play the violin, taking a photography class, or creating an invention of their own within the Maker Space

After school, elementary to high school students can participate in programming geared toward character development in the Youth Center within EECS’ building, help cook a meal for themselves and friends, and plan field trips to nearby colleges. For parents and adults with backgrounds ranging from Dayton natives, Latino transplants, and Middle Eastern refugees, the center assists with resume writing, employment soft skills, and credential-focused job training These are crucial services as the employers that offer on-site training grow even fewer and further between. East End has provided offerings such as forklift training, OSHA safety training, and asbestos abatement treatment training, enabling many in the area to get new jobs.

When reflecting on what specific accomplishment she is most proud of, Jan notes, "Between 2010 and 2013, we tore down about 120 blighted, vacant residential structures within a 16 square block area around the neighborhood public school and replaced them with 84 new, single-family, affordable, three- and fourbedroom homes that are to this day 100% occupied."

Over a decade later, these homes will soon be offered to the residents for ownership. These tax credit projects helped change the whole nature of the neighborhood, but because other neighborhood areas are still poor, East End is looking to do more work in affordable housing. She noted, "We understand that children do best when living in decent, affordable homes and safe, supportive neighborhoods."

Now as part of Jan’s ambitious whole-family initiative, East End will be retraining all their staff to become family coaches, recognizing that there are a lot of institutional barriers and racism that have developed over the years that make it very difficult for families to lift themselves out of poverty

Jan says, "Our job is to help them navigate those systems and solve their crisis, ask them to define their goals, and then help them achieve them. So, we're trying a whole different empowerment approach to break the cycle of generational poverty."

Mayor, city commissioners, East End Board members, and Jan (in black and white) cutting ribbon on the first 40 new homes to be built in the neighborhood in 50 years (2010)

Jan standing in front of one of the dilapidated homes that was torn down as part of East End's community revitalization project over a decade ago

Jan has been working with a team of people, including the former president of the University of Dayton, who's taken an active interest in this work. She says, "This team aims to transform East End's work so that the families we serve eventually don't need us anymore. We're trying to prevent the conditions that set people up for addiction, continued generational poverty, mental health issues, and incarceration. Let's target those conditions and fix things for people and families early on so that they don't get trapped in these negative cycles that affect and prevent the development of their well-being over time."

Jan has also volunteered her time and served as a board member or officer for several organizations, including:

Public Health – Dayton & Montgomery County; Dayton Children’s Medical Center Community Advisory Board for Community Health and Advocacy; The Widow’s Home;

Montgomery County Affordable Housing; United Way of the Greater Dayton Area; and Alliance for Nonprofit Executives

Her efforts to serve and uplift the Dayton community have earned her honors and recognition, including:

Community Service Award: Dayton Urban League (2009);

Appalachian Unsung Hero Award: Sinclair

Community College (2010);

Community Builder Award: The University of Dayton Fitz Center for Leadership in Community (2010);

Humanitarian Award: NCCJ of Greater Dayton (2012);

Community Collaborator Award: Legal Aid of Western Ohio/Volunteer Lawyers Project (2017); and

Special Achievement Alumni Award: The University of Dayton (2018).

When asked how she personally defines success, Jan had some inspiring words to share, "The work we do is successful when individuals realize they can do it themselves. So, our role is to find ways to help people in poverty build confidence. They've struggled with trauma for years, and the effects have been passed down from generation to generation. They don't believe they can do it."

"We have a saying: 'You might not be able to do it yet, but you will be able to in the future ' So, success is seeing that light come on when a child figures out he can do well on a standardized test. Success is seeing an adult have the confidence and the willingness to change. Success is helping folks recognize that they have the power to lift themselves out of poverty and rid the negative thoughts about a lack of hope It's not about the organization but the people we are there to help."

When asked to describe her leadership style, Jan said, "Some would call it laissez-faire or consensus-based.

When working with my staff, they have input on almost everything because I don't have all the answers We know that the families we serve have the answers. We just must help them sort it out. It’s the same with the staff. They know their jobs better than I know their jobs."

"My role is to get everybody around the table, have the conversation, get everyone’s perspectives, and make the final decision. Everybody has input, and we can get into some great debates. Some would call it “pounding the table,” but that's good. That's important. It's transparent, and that style contributes to generating the best ideas."

Among her leadership role models, Jan cites Star Trek’s Jean-Luc Picard as a great example, “There were occasionally scenes where he'd have everybody around a table on the Enterprise as alien ships approached and he'd say, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I'm open to suggestions ’ I love that! So, it's about leading a group of people I know are passionate about helping our community. I make sure they're heard, but the buck stops with me when we can't decide and come to a consensus."

"When asked what she enjoys most about working with WestCare, Jan shares, “I enjoy the diversity of people and talking with others doing great work in their communities in California, Puerto Rico, Guam, and elsewhere. Unfortunately, we don’t do that enough, but when we do, it is very enriching, and I get a lot of great ideas from those conversations "

"Also, being part of this much bigger financial collaborative with WestCare is vitally important. I did much of the grant writing for East End for over twenty years It got dicey when I knew I had all these mouths to feed We always made payroll, but some months were tighter than others. Now, the benefits WestCare offers enable us to attract great people. That's just enormously important because I’ve got to have the best people on the front lines working with these struggling families."

When asked to reflect on WestCare’s motto of “Uplifting the Human Spirit” and what that means for her, Jan noted, "Before joining WestCare, what it meant was that we were helping children and families live up to their God-given potential. But now, understanding the role that counseling and therapy play – a big part of what WestCare does – makes the words much more beautiful. People can become so handicapped by the burden of generational poverty, and that gets transmitted down, resulting in many of their children

“When I started working in Dayton’s East End neighborhood about 25 years ago, we asked the community how we could help. The neighborhood leadership at the time said, ‘Our children have no dreams. They have no thoughts about the future. There is no hope ’ There was no support for changing lives or improving overall well-being regarding their educational outcomes, health outcomes, social connectedness, physical environment, and income."

"So, when you uplift the human spirit, you find a way for people to understand that there's more to life and that we need their untapped potential as a community, as a neighborhood, and as a society to uplift who we are. So, this work East End does is just a different side of the work WestCare has done for all these years, and I'm proud to be part of it."

Jan and her husband, Don (whom she describes as “amazing and supportive”), have three grown children. The oldest, Elizabeth, works in development at a wellknown private school in Dayton. Their son, Adam, was recently married and is very happy in a high-tech data analytics role in Chicago Their youngest, Caroline, is married and the mother of their only grandchild, Emma, who is 11.

"We have lots of friends as well, and it's just been a

I am proud of what we have accomplished together and grateful for continued support from the community. Together, we are helping break the cycle of multi-generational poverty that has crippled our community for far too long.

Jan Lepore-Jentleson