Pateros Resource Center considers options for remaining assistance

PATEROS – The meeting of the board of directors of the Pateros Brewster Community Resource Center (PBCRC) on April 26, was short but consequential. After dispensing with the election of officers for the next year members turned their attention to remaining assistance the agency has available.

“Our Covid assistance is diminishing,” said executive director Gene Dowers. “I don’t know if the need is diminishing as much as the organization, we work for has used up its budget.”

Requests for that help has declined as well.

“We still have lots of assistance available but we’re not getting the requests through the channels we normally hear from,” said Dowers. “One of the things we’re looking at is trying to deal with the inventory we have before our fiscal year ends, which is the first of July.”

PBCRC will not lose those resources when that date arrives.

“It stays with us whether we use it or not, which is nice,” said Dowers providing examples. “We can donate it to food banks or use it for fire relief if we have fires.”

The administrative part which usually sends us our referrals has gone offline so we’re working on getting that back.

PBCRC continues working with the Okanogan County Community Action Council on rental assistance, a program that, according to Dowers, “is going very well.”

WorkSource in Okanogan sends a representative to PBCRC every Thursday, “and she’s busy all day,” said Dowers. “She is jammed all day long with a full schedule of appointments and walk-ins.”