Eisenberg will match all donations made through the end of 2015 to the organization devoted to protecting women and children from domestic violence.
“Middle Way House operates 24 hours a day, 365 days a year,” Toby Strout, Middle Way’s executive director, said in an email. “No holidays or snow days. No closing because work has to be done on the building. No seasonal slowdowns. We are there literally all the time and, while we make extensive use of volunteers, the state mandates that paid staff be on the premises at all times.”
The organization is also required to only hire paid staff who have had adequate, state-approved training. This training is expensive, Strout said. And though the state requires the training, it does not supply the funds to pay for it.
She explained that the nonprofit, a United Way agency, is responsible for raising more than 30 percent of its budget.
“In such circumstances, the last thing we need to be doing is making payments on mortgages, which, even with favorable rates, ends up costing a lot in interest, money that could go toward services,” Strout said. “We have as a goal retiring the mortgage by the end of the year. Jesse’s gift is a great way to stimulate giving toward that end.”
Strout said the money will go to retiring the mortgage on the organization’s New Wings facility, which opened as the Middle Way administrative headquarters in 2010.
“There’s little substitute for celebrity power when you’re trying to get noticed and generate support for necessary work,” Strout said. “With Jesse we have the added benefit of his keen intelligence, sensitivity and wit. He’s not spouting memorized lines. He’s talking from the heart. He’s a terrific asset.”
Eisenberg did not randomly select the nonprofit, which provided emergency shelter to 246 women and children in 2013, according to its website.
He is close friends with Strout’s daughter, Anna Strout, who graduated from IU in 2000. Strout said Eisenberg has spent a good deal of time with her family and they have become close.
After expressing an interest in Strout’s work, Eisenberg attended a Middle Way House Mission Tour. At the end, he surprised Strout with the donation offer.
Though they are not currently in the midst of a major fundraising campaign, Strout said Middle Way will begin reaching out more to new donors in November.
The upcoming campaign will also include what Strout described as a “special challenge” for IU students.
Strout said she appreciates the sacrifice Eisenberg is making to help the organization.
“Of course, I know Jesse, and our home has been a place where he can just be himself,” Strout said. “I’m very grateful that he’s willing to give up some of that peace, another shelter from the spotlight, to support Middle Way’s work on behalf of victims of domestic violence and sexual assault.”
