What does that mean for the people who rely on their services?
On July 1, United Cerebral Palsy of Greater Chicago and Seguin Services will start a new chapter. It will give children and adults with disabilities access to more services.
The plans to merge started four years ago .
" We wanted to make sure the partnership was right that it would provide more opportunities for the people we serve that it would provide more opportunities for the employment that we both employ," said Paul Dulle , CEO of UCP-Greater Chicago.
Seguin Services CEO John Voit see a positive future with the merger.
"We think it's going to enhance our ability to raise more money to increase our mission to provide more services because two organization have a rich history that goes back probably to the early 50s," Voit said.
Both CEOs are looking forward to the benefits
"Seguin Services provide quality residential services, one of the largest providers in the state. United Cerebral Palsy provides no services, but we do provide adult services," said Voit.
"We also provide services to millions students through our Infinitech program across the United States, a quality program that we have provided for 15 years that Seguin Services does not do," said Dulle. "They do provide excellent transition programs."
"We have about 600 individuals with disabilities, both children and adults at the Seguin site. UCP has a large extensive service that includes school districts across the nation," Voit said. "We have about 650 staff at Seguin. That includes foster parents for adults and children. UCP has about 60 staff at this point. They leverage a lot of time through technology servicing children primarily in school districts as well as adults," Voit said.
"We are both in a period of strength, and we did it now when we can do something that would really impact meaningfully our community and our service," Dulle said.
"We can secure well into the future, 5 or 10 years from now, we can bring both organizations together and basically afford ourselves the opportunity to grow even further," said Voit.
The new name will be UCP Seguin of Greater Chicago. John Voit will remain CEO of the new organization while Paul Dulle will be CEO of a foundation .
For more information, go to www.Seguin.org or www.ucpnet.org.
