The Arc San Francisco exceeds $3.3MM goal while reducing wait times for services

Learn how The Arc San Francisco raised more than $3.3MM to invest in its people, expand programs, and help more adults with developmental disabilities access critical services sooner.

For 75 years, The Arc San Francisco has supported adults with developmental disabilities in San Francisco, Marin, and San Mateo counties. Today, the organization serves approximately 800 adults, helping remove barriers to inclusion and supporting people as they pursue meaningful opportunities in work, education, health, and community life.

The Challenge:

As The Arc San Francisco developed a new strategic plan, its leaders identified a serious barrier to serving more people: staffing.

Pay for frontline staff was not sustainable, making it difficult to hire and retain the people needed to deliver services. The effects were felt directly by adults with developmental disabilities waiting to participate in The Arc San Francisco’s programs. At one point, the average wait for services had reached 22 months.

The organization knew it needed to grow, but doing so would require a significant investment in its people and programs. As Senior Director of Advancement Services Esther Landau explained, people with developmental disabilities already encounter barriers to inclusion throughout their lives. The Arc San Francisco did not want access to its own services to become another one.

That led The Arc San Francisco to launch We Are the Future, an ambitious $3.3MM capital campaign. Unlike a traditional building campaign, the primary investment would be in organizational capacity: approximately $2.5MM for increased staff compensation and $800,000 for program growth.

The Solution:

Capital Campaign Pro connected Esther and The Arc San Francisco team with Advisor Xan Blake, who served as a coach, mentor, and campaign consultant throughout the process.

“Esther, and her colleagues at The Arc San Francisco, pursued the campaign with discipline, creativity and humor. The donors to the campaign saw the value of a capacity building campaign and now The Arc does a better job of fulfilling its mission. That’s what campaigns are all about!”

Xan Blake, Capital Campaign Pro Advisor

Together, the team conducted a Guided Feasibility Study, with The Arc San Francisco’s own leaders meeting directly with donors while Xan provided training, structure, and support. For Esther, who was still relatively new to the organization, those conversations also gave her an opportunity to build relationships with key supporters firsthand.

Xan provided ongoing strategic guidance throughout the campaign, helped the board understand its role and the demands the campaign would place on staff leadership, and kept the team focused on the activities that mattered most.

The campaign also challenged The Arc San Francisco to find creative ways to engage donors. At its public-phase launch, the organization created an immersive experience that allowed guests to encounter some of the bureaucratic, transportation, and other barriers that people with developmental disabilities can face when trying to access services. Esther also used highly personal donor outreach, including informal one-to-one videos, to build relationships and keep conversations moving.

The Impact:

The Arc San Francisco ultimately exceeded its $3.3MM goal, raising $3,303,445 from 242 donors. More significant than the fundraising total is what that investment made possible. Key outcomes include:

• 140 adults with developmental disabilities began receiving services
• Average wait times fell from 22 months to under six months
• 32 new staff members were hired
• Direct Support Professionals received a 25% wage increase
• Family support services, mental health resources, internships, and personalized life-skills programming expanded
• New initiatives included an internship program with the San Francisco Recreation and Park Department and Coordinated Family Support, a program to support the entire family unit — both the client and their caregivers.

Rather than waiting until the campaign was finished to put the funds to work, The Arc San Francisco began investing campaign dollars in staffing and programs as they were raised. The result was measurable change taking place while the campaign itself was still underway.

“It was so phenomenal to have Xan as a coach, mentor, consultant. I learned a huge amount from her, and I really appreciated her high-level perspective and her knowledge about how different campaigns have worked.”

Esther Landau, Senior Director of Advancement Services

Esther described the Guided Feasibility Study as “worth its weight in gold” and the regular cadence of meetings and strategic guidance as “invaluable.”

Looking Ahead:

The success of We Are the Future demonstrates that a capital campaign doesn’t have to fund a building to create lasting capacity.

The Arc San Francisco used its campaign to invest directly in the people and programs at the heart of its mission. More staff means more adults can access services. Better compensation supports stronger staff recruitment and retention. Expanded programs create new opportunities for people with developmental disabilities throughout the Bay Area.

For The Arc San Francisco, the clearest measure of the campaign’s success may be the simplest: people who once waited nearly two years for services are now waiting less than six months.