Usually, it’s the United Way of the Coastal Empire’s Liberty County unit responding to the needs of its member agencies.

This time, one of its partners came through when the United Way needed it the most.

Thanks to help from the Fraser Counseling Center, community representatives and officials from the United Way of the Coastal Empire cut the ribbon on the United Way of Liberty County’s new home on Tupelo Trail, not far from the Liberty County YMCA and the Fraser Counseling Center.

“We’re very relieved,” said United Way of the Coastal Empire-Liberty County director Kristin Hopkins-Graham. “The Fraser Center came to our rescue, so it truly is collaborative and a partnership. We’re so grateful.”

The United Way’s Liberty County home was on Olive Street. But they were about to lose it. And incoming board chairman Danny Creasy faced a problem.

“I said, ‘That cannot happen in Liberty County.’ I was in a panic,” Creasy said.

He approached his boss, James Rogers at Ameris Bank, and Rogers pointed him in Larry Golden’s direction.

“I said, ‘I’m about to train wreck United Way,’” Creasy recalled. “He said, ‘I know a man,’ and that man was Larry Golden.”

Creasy met with Golden and they walked around the building, which was first built to be the Sandy Run School more than 40 years ago.

“It was perfect,” Creasy said.

Moving into its new space off Tupelo Trail also may save the United Way about $15,000 a year, United Way of the Coastal Empire Executive Director Brynn Grant said.

“That kind of money is no joke,” she said. “The United Way’s mission is to improve lives by mobilizing the caring power of community. And this is a perfect example of the caring power of community.”

Golden said on behalf of the Fraser Foundation for Families and the Mary Lou Fraser Community Support Foundation that the new United Way home matches up well and he hoped they can raise more money for the United Way.

Liberty County Commission Chairman Donald Lovette added the 11 Black Men also are housed in the same building and said the United Way being in that edifice fits Dr. Whit Fraser’s dream of community service.

“We can do better work together,” Lovette said.

Hopkins-Graham said the new location is strategic too, with its proximity to the Y, Fraser Counseling Center and the Hazel Carter Senior Citizens Center.

“Even having a presence here is important,” she said. “To help families when they need it is vital.