The American Red Cross has announced plans to expand its programs and services to every community in the CSRA, including Lincoln County, through its ARC (Achieving Revolutionary Change)-One initiative.

For 126 years, the American Red Cross has been fulfilling its mission of helping people prevent, prepare for, and respond to emergencies. However, both the increase in catastrophic disasters and in public, media, and governmental scrutiny have presented challenges that the agency must address.

During the past two years, volunteers and staff members from across the country have been working to find ways to meet these challenges. As a result, the American Red Cross will spend the next two years building a stronger, more unified and agile organization to effectively and efficiently meet the changing needs of its clients through the new ARC-One program.

ARC-One has four objectives:

(1) To enhance the Red Cross' presence in communities by increasing the number of programs, services, and volunteers in each community.

(2) To employ task forces to simplify and standardize back office functions so that more time and money can be utilized to provide services and programs to all communities.

(3) To increase and enhance partnerships and relationships with businesses, vendors, and community agencies.

(4) To enhance the Red Cross' ability to raise funds to meet the everincreasing expectations of its constituents.

"As ARC-One becomes fully implemented during the next two years, there will be no changes made in the programs and services provided to our constituents," explained Kathleen Kosmoski, executive director of the American Red Cross of Augusta. "What will change is our ability to offer more services and programs to more communities in a more timely fashion."

The director reported that the Red Cross has currently recruited three volunteers to respond to house fires in Lincoln County and continues to seek additional volunteers to help support this effort "We will also be working with local officials to identify potential shelters and train volunteers to manage those shelters."

Likewise, as part of the ARC-One initiative, the Red Cross will be offering programs such as CPR and First Aid training in each community.

In other comments, Kosmoski said, "This is a very exciting time for the American Red Cross. We know the American people expect us to be there at a moment's notice, and we are working hard to meet those expectations.

"Over the next several months, Red Cross staff and volunteers will be working with the citizens of Lincoln County to determine how best to fulfill our mission," she continued. "In order for ARC-One to be successful, we will need the support and volunteer efforts of the people of the county."

The American Red Cross of Augusta serves the counties of Lincoln, Wilkes, Richmond, Columbia, Burke, Glascock, Jefferson, Jenkins, McDuffie, Taliaferro, and Warren.

For more information about the ARC-One program, contact the American Red Cross of Augusta at 706-724-8481.