Reflections on our goals for the upcoming years from Gabe Shapiro, Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director

Hello Everyone! If you’ve been following our feed, you will have heard from staff and alumni about everything that All In Energy has accomplished in its first 5 years. If you haven’t seen those videos you should go back and learn how your support has helped create an organization that already has so much to be proud of. 

Your support enabled us to prove our model to the Massachusetts utilities who have chosen us to lead the program that is the center of their energy equity work. This has come with a sustainable funding model that is likely to help us continue the great work we are doing in Massachusetts for the foreseeable future. 
Our program’s success has created opportunities for us to build upon this strong foundation and continue to expand our impact.

While our core programming has created meaningful access to beneficial programs for our target populations, we know that too many are still facing barriers to participate. And as our state’s focus evolves from weatherization to more complex projects related to electrification, new higher barriers are emerging. Access to clean energy jobs are still out of reach to many and because of this, the diverse workforce necessary to better serve these populations is still lacking In 2024, we are going to tackle these challenges in the Merrimack Valley by providing in-person and phone support and project facilitation to Spanish speakers, landlords, and low-to-moderate income families.

We will support families in learning about programs that can fully decarbonize their heating and cooling and also directly support them in selecting and communicating with vendors. The staff we hire there will be getting valuable on the job experience and also classroom training while earning the certifications necessary to become Energy auditors so that more Spanish speaking families can learn about their homes from an expert who speaks their language.
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We are in talks with potential funders to replicate this program to serve the Portuguese speakers on the Southcoast, and we are beginning early conversations with decision makers in Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New York to explore replicating parts of our model there as soon as 2025. We can connect hundreds of thousands of families and individuals to beneficial energy programs and clean energy jobs across our region, but resources in addition to those secured to fund our existing program are needed to make this a reality.

We will need to continue to invest in our amazing team to take on these new challenges, we need providing them with training and support to help them grow into new roles. Another part of supporting our diverse team is recommitting to our work in Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. We seek to integrate best practices on DEI into our culture, policies, programs and our organizational growth. We’re hiring a DEI consultant this next year to help us do a DEI audit to better understand where we should focus this continued growth.

Additionally, as we move out of the pandemic, we are hearing more from staff about a desire to work in person together. We are exploring the potential of having a couple of home-base offices where people can convene in person, boosting the internal culture, mental health of our team and effectiveness of our work. 
We also need to be able to be competitive on salaries and benefits as well as to support them with internal services through human resources, finance, and management infrastructure.

Finally, launching new programs as a nonprofit is hard. Despite our track record of success, we are unable to take investments on which our future success can provide a financial return. We need resources to fund the development, piloting and refinement of new programs and we are counting on supporters like you, who only desire a social return on your investment in form our lives touched, homes made more comfortable, energy bills reduced, and careers launched to contribute to the philanthropic resources necessary to for our growth.

Thanks for watching and thanks again for all your support over these past 5 years. Hope my story and the others you’ve heard have inspired you to support the next five years of our growth.