The burial of the time capsule in July was one highlight of a year-long celebration marking half a century of the organization's contributions – anything from making sure a single mother can feed her children to providing funds to help a family pay its utility bills and much, much more.
Generations from now, community leaders will gather to unseal a time capsule buried on the grounds of 350 Marshall St. in Phillipsburg.
They'll ooh and aah over photographs and reports documenting how one agency with the unwieldy title of NORWESCAP was able to meet the diverse needs of so many residents through so many tumultuous years.
But for staff and volunteers at the Northwest New Jersey Community Action Partnership, it's all in a day's work. And the community they serve is all the richer for it.
The burial of the time capsule in July was one highlight of a year-long celebration marking half a century of the organization's contributions - anything from making sure a single mother can feed her children to providing funds to help a family pay its utility bills and much, much more.
MORE: NORWESCAP honored by Warren County freeholders
In August of 1965, Lady Bird Johnson came to NORWESCAP offices to open its Head Start program, one month after the local agency was officially launched under the auspices of the federal Economic Opportunity Act.
It was the era of LBJ's "Great Society," a sweeping set of initiatives enlisting every level of government to address the crippling effects of poverty.
Beginning with Hunterdon, Sussex and Warren counties, the reach gradually extended to Morris, Somerset and Passaic counties, blanketing the region with services that grew to include a Career and Life Planning Center for Women and a homelessness prevention program.
Today, an estimated 35,000 people receive NORWESCAP support in one form or another every year.
In 2013, the organization officially changed the "P" in its name from program to partnership, signifying the collaborative nature of its work.
It may take a village to raise a child, but it takes the combined efforts of more than 140 private foundations, industry, individuals, faith-based organizations and state agencies to keep such an enterprise operating efficiently.
Community needs may have changed over the decades to reflect the state's fiscal realities, and the number of people served may have soared. But the organization's mission remains steadfast: to support low-income households as they move toward self-sufficiency and self-reliance.
To this end, one-third of the seats on the NORWESCAP board of trustees are reserved for members of such households or their advocates.
It's a grim reality that New Jersey's recovery from the fiscal disaster of 2008 hasn't kept pace with that of its neighbors.
We pray those officials discovering NORWESCAP's time capsule in the indeterminate future will live in a more economically stable New Jersey. Until then, we're grateful the organization continues to flourish and extend its safety net so far and so wide.