{"id":156,"date":"2022-08-11T14:18:23","date_gmt":"2022-08-11T14:18:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/?page_id=156"},"modified":"2026-01-07T14:26:41","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T14:26:41","slug":"paula-herring-2","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/?page_id=156","title":{"rendered":"Paula Herring"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Paula Herring<\/h1>\n\n\n\n

Vice President & Treasurer<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

21 Years at Meadows<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I serve the people of Texas by providing oversight of the Foundation\u2019s financial operations to ensure we exist in perpetuity. I help honor and fulfill our commitments to grantees, vendors, regulatory agencies, our Board of Directors, the Meadows family, and our founders. <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Most Impactful Experience at the Foundation<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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We have completely transformed our business processes. While we were working on changes incrementally, the pandemic sped up our timeline. It created a sudden requirement to shift our entire mode of financial operations. It changed everything. We brought on new staff members, maintained our commitment to the highest level of compliance and due diligence, and created more efficiency and transparency. <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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What the Pandemic Changed<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Rituals<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

It was easy to get lost in the stack of to-do notes, meetings, and Excel spreadsheets. I made time to go outdoors every day to capture a little downtime in the yard or go for a walk or bike ride.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Stockpiled<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Snacks! I love numbers, but I don\u2019t want to be specific about the increase in anything dark chocolate at my house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Holiday Gatherings<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

My husband and son ended up with COVID at Christmas. Since my daughter and I both work in accounting, we couldn’t afford to be sick at the beginning of the year because it’s the busy season for us. We still wanted to celebrate together and made it a socially distanced Christmas dinner and present exchange in our backyard. Thankfully the weather was good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Motivation<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Grantees count on us to pay their grant awards as quickly as possible. During the early days of the pandemic when everything was changing almost daily, we understood how critical our funding was and could not let them down. When people are in need of help immediately, we can’t fail. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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View of Philanthropy & Our Work<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Philanthropy really responded and stepped up during the pandemic. At the Foundation, it was wonderful to watch how our work supported the community as well as the personal investments made by our staff, Board of Directors, and the Meadows family in volunteering and monetary donations. The Board increased our matching grants program to $2:$1 and the program paid out more than it ever has. <\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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What I’m Looking Forward To<\/h2>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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I love helping people and coming alongside them to make our work more meaningful. We are having more collaborative discussions than ever before, whether it is among staff or with grantees. This expanded meaning of collaboration lets us be more creative and will strengthen our mission and those we serve.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Paula Herring Vice President & Treasurer 21 Years at Meadows I serve the people of Texas by providing oversight of the Foundation\u2019s financial operations to ensure we exist in perpetuity. I help honor and fulfill our commitments to grantees, vendors, regulatory agencies, our Board of Directors, the Meadows family, and our founders. Most Impactful Experience ...","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"parent":27,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_themeisle_gutenberg_block_has_review":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-156","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/156\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/27"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ar.mfi.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}