At Federation of Organizations, CEO Barbara Faron builds on a 50-year legacy of empowering the community’s most vulnerable citizens.
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At Federation of Organizations, CEO Barbara Faron builds on a 50-year legacy of empowering the community’s most vulnerable citizens. An elderly veteran finds meaning and purpose volunteering as a foster grandparent. A young woman enrolls in higher education courses after overcoming addiction. A man struggling with homelessness, mental illness, and recurring psychiatric hospitalizations follows his medication regiment and attends therapy in monitored recovery housing. These outcomes are all stories of success at Federation of Organizations, Long Island and New York City’s premier provider of cost-effective, evidence-based health, social, and economic services.
Led by CEO Barbara Faron—a woman of action who is using her over 40 years of professional experience to make a difference for individuals and the community—Federation empowers vulnerable populations including individuals in recovery, those living with chronic medical conditions, adult home residents, people without housing, low-income seniors, and at-risk children. Offering residential, outpatient, and program-based services, Federation treats the whole person with a wide range of services from care coordination, housing, and clinical treatment to employment, peer advocacy, and rehabilitative services.
“We take a holistic, team-based approach to helping the vulnerable, because struggling individuals require whole-person and community solutions,” says Faron. “ The work we do here is seeing people from a strengths-based perspective and matching their needs with services and programs to help them improve their health, live independently, and achieve their goals.”
Achieving Milestones
Founded in 1972 by a small group of parents advocating for better care for their loved ones struggling with mental illness, the West Babylon based Federation has become a major health and human services agency. Among Federation’s longest-standing programs are its Foster Grandparent program, which provides low-income seniors a stipend to serve as volunteers in schools and day care centers, and the Senior Companion program, which trains seniors to provide support and companionship to isolated older adults. New milestones include certification from the state’s Office of Addiction Services and Supports to open a new chemical dependency outpatient treatment program in Copiague, construction of two major affordable housing developments, and expansion of the Wyandanch Clinic as a Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic.
A 42-year veteran of Federation herself, Faron is leading a much-anticipated 50-year celebration in November for a team of more than 600 employees and the community. “What our incredible, diverse team all have in common is a desire to help people and a passion for the work we do. We would not have gotten through the challenges of the last two years without our amazing staff, who continued to show up for work, caring for the people we serve and helping us continue to carry out our mission to improve the lives of thousands of vulnerable community members,” she says.