What You’ll Learn
- See how Salal’s partnership with HealthPoint community healthcare network is positively impacting communities in the Puget Sound region.
- Learn about Salal’s support of the HealthPoint Community Connection Fund.
Salal’s partnership with HealthPoint community healthcare network goes back many years. Our support for HealthPoint is in keeping with our 75-year tradition of supporting nurses, doctors, and other healthcare professionals. Our credit union was originally called Group Health Employee Credit Union. We were founded back in 1948 by nine Group Health employees who pooled together $45 to start a credit union. So, it’s safe to say we have healthcare in our DNA.
HealthPoint is a network of non-profit health centers committed to delivering expert, high-quality healthcare to all, regardless of a person’s circumstances. Since 1971, HealthPoint has worked to enhance community health and remove barriers to healthcare access, believing that everyone deserves great care irrespective of their income, language, or health status. Currently, the network operates 20 locations, offering medical care, dental care, naturopathic medicine, behavioral health care, social services, case management, and an on-site pharmacy.
As a longtime supporter of HealthPoint, it was a great honor to be recognized by their team as the 2022 HealthPoint Partner of the Year. Salal members made it possible for us to give over $46,000 in funding to HealthPoint this past year, much of which went to support the HealthPoint Community Connection Fund.
“We’re proud to be able to support HealthPoint and their employees,” said Salal CEO Russ Rosendal. “We’ve been contributing to HealthPoint for over a decade. The service and level of care that HealthPoint employees give to our communities is invaluable to the Puget Sound region.”
“In meeting with HealthPoint and learning more about the Community Connection Fund program, it was obvious that there was a benefit to the community, and it just needed a little boost to help it get off the ground,” added Matt Vance, Salal’s VP of Marketing. “Salal is able to directly support our community through financial services, but we also know that HealthPoint can help our neighbors in ways we aren’t able to. HealthPoint does vital and critical work in our region, especially with low-income and at-risk communities.”
“Establishing the Community Connection Fund with Salal Credit Union has been an amazing process,” said HealthPoint Care Support Director Sarah Jemley. “I would say that the fund itself is just absolutely invaluable. It is something that we are able to leverage in the community, with our partners, with patients who are very high risk, have significant needs, and have very unusual gaps in their cares. There truly is no other program or resource like this.” Jemley also noted that, “addressing these gaps in care, where there truly is no other option, is one of the most successful strategies that I have come across to be able to really build a future for patients in our community.”
“We had a patient who was living in an apartment that got infested with bedbugs. He had to throw away every single thing that he owed before he moved. He was able to move into a new apartment, but then he had no furniture, no clothing, nothing. He needed a lot of medical equipment that needed to be attached to his bed. I was able to work with him and connect him to Northwest Furniture Bank and get a bed and furniture for his entire apartment. But he didn’t have a car to get those items delivered, so I was able to use the Salal Credit Union funds to support him in paying for a bed delivery fee. Now he’s able to get his medical equipment at home. So, thank you to Salal Credit Union for all their support and the funds they have been able to provide to HealthPoint for us to support our patients.”
—Irma Mendoza,
HealthPoint Supervisor of Social Work and Care
Positive impacts like these are made possible by Salal members choosing to do their banking and financing with our credit union. It’s because of them that we are able to provide this much-needed funding to a vital community organization. We look forward to seeing the impact that HealthPoint and the Community Connection Fund will continue to have on our region, especially for low-income and at-risk communities.
