United Way hopes to encourage more leaders with riverfront event

"I love helping people," said Samantha Richardson a 22-year-old Southeast Missouri Hospital employee who lives in Cape Girardeau. Just a few semesters away from completing her nursing degree, Richardson believes her career puts her closest to doing what she loves.

Richardson's sensitivity toward helping others may have been why she was at the United Way's Emerging Leaders Oktoberfest event Oct. 1 on the river side of the Cape Girardeau floodwall.

"When I heard about it on the news, I was very surprised to hear that the event was not a United Way fundraising sales pitch," she said.

Richardson grew up involved in mission work, building houses and pulling weeds with in her church youth group. Since moving here from St. Louis three years ago, she has participated in fundraising walks and nursing fairs and donated blood. She participates in the United Way payroll deduction at work and said she is "really, really interested in finding out more about the Emerging Leaders Society."

The Emerging Leaders Society reaches out to get young professionals actively involved in United Way. Its November event is a Habitat for Humanity build for a Big Brothers Big Sisters family. December's plans include a Christmas party to benefit children ages 13 to 17, and in January there will be a leadership development program.

"It may be a lunch-and-learn type of meeting," Emerging Leaders coordinator Holly Lintner said.

"The focus of Emerging Leaders Society is to get people plugged into the community," she said.

ELIZABETH DODD ~ edodd@semissourian.com From left, Samantha Richardson of Cape Girardeau Jeff Stiebel of Cape Girardeau, Abby Kieninger of Jackson and Kyle Kieninger of Jackson sit by the river Oct. 1 and enjoy food and music at an Emerging Leaders Society United Way event at the riverfront in Cape Girardeau.

Lintner said that after finishing college, starting a family and working for a St. Louis-based company, she "didn't really know how to connect to the community."

Emerging Leaders is meant to assist with connecting to other goal-oriented, young professionals and help the community at the same time. Some people at the Oktoberfest were already connected with the community and just wanted to do more.

Carl Boitnott and his wife, Julie, of Cape Girardeau have just finished training as Court Appointed Special Advocates.

Boitnott said they got involved with Emerging Leaders because they like giving back to the community.

"It gives you a good feeling," he said. "The community has given us a lot. The community provides my livelihood."

Boitnott owns his own painting business, but the couple's reasons for getting involved go beyond work. They have been foster parents for their son, Damien Gills, since he was 4 months old, and have learned a lot about guardianship, adoption and foster parenting through the community. They are still trying to attain guardianship of Damien, who is now almost 5 years old.

"If we can give back and help people we surely will," Boitnott said.

Other emerging leaders were looking for a place to belong; one that promotes good will.

Jason Schaper of Cape Girardeau, a single parent of 5-year-old Paris Schaper, is an electrician who attended the Oktoberfest.

"Other people have helped me before, and I'd like to get involved," he said. Schaper is signed up to attend the Habitat build and plans to bring his daughter along.

"She has her own set of tools," he said.

Schaper said he felt accepted at the Oktoberfest and that because his daughter is being raised in a single-parent family, he thinks she will benefit from being around positive influences at Emerging Leaders events. For this, he's willing to make a time commitment to the group.

For more information about the UW Emerging Leaders' Society call Holly Lintner at 334-9634.

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