Today we’d like to introduce you to Jillian Palmiotto.
Hi Jillian, so excited to have you on the platform. So, before we get into questions about your work life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today.
In my first career, I was a special education teacher for 12 years. I transitioned from the public school system to vocational ministry, launching a special needs and disability ministry at my church in 2014. When I first began the ministry, we were trying to figure out how to best include 5 children who had special needs with a variety of diagnoses. I served in this role for 7 1/2 years, and in that time, the ministry grew from those 5 families to 170 that we were serving in 2020. During the pandemic, we had to figure out a new way of meeting needs for our church family. They could no longer come to church, so we had to go to them. However, because there weren’t very many special needs ministries around, we had families who traveled over an hour to be involved in our church community. As one of two staff members dedicated to our special needs families, I knew we would not be able to get to everyone in Metro-Atlanta alone. So, I came up with a plan to simply call 10 families a day to see how our church could support their family during that time. As I began to spend time on the phone with these families, hearing their lived experience as a family impacted by disability during ag lobal pandemic, I began to truly understand the real needs these families were facing. These needs included everything from appliance repair to financial needs to marriage support and counseling to the need for caregivers to help with the kids who were all doing virtual school. There stories were gut-wrenching. So we prayed, encouraged, and moved to action to meet their needs. Throughout this process, I began to wonder which government agency, non-profit, or corporation was the one-stop-shop for the families to get support. Do you know what I found? There isn’t one in GA! So, I began on my quest to start it in order to provide a roadmap to families of how to get the supports they needed for each stage of life, how to manage the supports, and how to plan ahead for the support they would need in the future. I also recognized that the state government would not ever be able to keep up with adequately supporting the growing number of people with disabilities in GA since there are already 2,000,000 people in our state who are diagnosed with a disability. I knew the Church would need to be part of the solution. So, in January 2021, we launched Together We Care, a nonprofit that meets the practical needs of families in our communities and equips local churches with inclusion strategies to help care for these families and create places for them to belong – places where they are missed when they don’t show up. We began by meeting with families one on one to develop a free resource plan for them. In the last three years, we have connected 500 families with resources to help them obtain housing, food, employment, funding, caregivers, transportation, and faith communities. It is an honor to watch the transformation happen in the family unit when they just have a partner helping them through their parenting journey.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Nope. Not at all. It has been hard but so incredibly rewarding. It has been difficult to make sense of all of the difficult government systems, applications, and processes that agencies such as Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, and the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities make you go through. But not only have we figured them out, struggling through them has taught us how to better assist families in getting the services they need.
And as a nonprofit, it’s always difficult trusting God for where the funding is coming from. We are so grateful to our generous donors who have supported us the last three years and the small grants that we have been able to get. When you don’t charge for any of the services you provide to families, we can only do so much each week. So, the hardest part is knowing that we are only serving 500 families when we have 1,999,500 more to go. With more funding, we would be able to hire a staff and serve more families. Currently, there are only 2 full-time staff and one part-time staff trying to reach all of the families.
We are so grateful for some of the churches in our network and a few faithful givers who have come alongside us to meet these needs.
As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
We specialize in everything special needs and disability related. We are the only agency in GA that assesses what resources a family has available, what education they need about resources, and then provide a step-by-step plan to help the entire family thrive so that a person with a disability and their family members can all lead a fruitful, independent life. We love creating opportunities for individuals when there seems to be no opportunity available.
We have become well known for our family resource plans, our parent roadmap, and our ability to effectively train faith communities with disability inclusion strategies.
I think what I am most proud of is the growth of the individuals we are supporting. We have been able to get homeless families with children with special needs off of the streets, have helped moms and dads find employment and learn to manage money in order to save for their child’s future, help couples find marriage couples when they were on the verge of divorce. We have also assisted individuals with disabilities find their purpose, obtain employment, find community, and navigate transportation independently.
What sets us apart is that we are doing something different than any other organization in GA. Our innovative approach of creating a customized plan for each family and breaking that plan into manageable steps is helping to transform lives one family at a time.
Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
The most credit belongs to the Lord. Without my faith and the instruction in the Bible to love God and love others, I would not be compelled to reach this population of families. I believe that my faith and what I learn from scripture provides the wisdom and passion to see lives transformed.
Secondly, my family. My husband and partner in ministry, Anthony, is the backbone of our organization. He is the Director of Operations of our company and is the one who makes sure everything is crossed, and every I am dotted. He is my biggest supporter and the glue that keeps everything together. He is the one who took a leap of faith with me, agreed to sell everything we had to start a nonprofit, and has continued to make sure we do everything with excellence. And my two children, Samantha and Nicholas, who have spent countless hours building websites, creating graphics, writing emails, volunteering with families, planning and pulling off events, and serving their community. They inspire me every day to just love my neighbors well. I also thank my parents, Tommy and Cathy Brown, who always told me I could do anything I put my mind to and have never once even suggested that I pause to consider other ideas. They just go right along with whatever crazy idea I come with it and tell me to go do it!
I also owe credit to the many pastors, mentors, and friends at Mount Paran Church in Atlanta who have encouraged me over the years – Dr. David Cooper, Pastors Todd and Karen Rainwater, Joseph Tvaroch, Joy Motter, Wes Lutes, Ken Chatham, Fabiana McKown, Angie Chatham, John Watkins, Brad Jones, and many more. They have brainstormed, listened, cheered me on, encouraged, and prayed.
A huge shout-out belongs to our board members. They are the ones who have truly made our organization what it is today. When I first began thinking about who should be invited to be part of our first advisory board, I sat down and made a list of all of the things I was good at – things like connecting with people, life coaching, encouraging others, serving, behavior management, teaching strategies, training people to work with individuals with disabilities, and building programs. Then, I made a list of all the things I didn’t know how to do – scale a business, corporate finance, media and communications, human resources, marketing, and fundraising, to name a few. And I pondered who knew that were experts in each of those fields and asked them to come alongside me to implement a massive vision to reach every person in GA that has a disability with a resource plan. And they all said yes! Without their advice, support, and innovative ideas, we would not be serving nearly as many people as we are today.
Last but not least, the people we serve with special needs and disabilities deserve the credit. The things they are willing to do to fight for their rights, the sacrifices they make to live and thrive in a world that wasn’t built for them, and the perseverance and determination to continue pushing to have access to the things the rest of us take for granted, inspires me. I do what I do for them and with them. I am honored that they call me their ally and friend.
Pricing:
- Our resource plans are free, and we will soon have online videos that will walk parents through the parent roadmap that will be available for free as well
- The services that we offer to families cost our organization $600/year per family (or $50/month). If anyone would like to sponsor a family, they can make a monthly donation of $50 to help us serve one family for the rest of their lives.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.togetherwecarega.org/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/togetherwecarega/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TogetherWeCareGA/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jillian-palmiotto-50107981/
- Other: https://www.togetherconference.net/
Image Credits
Samantha Palmiotto
