Press Release:
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Executive Director of Henry and William Evans Home for Children (Evans Home) to retire.
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After more than 25 years of dedicated service to the Evans Home, Marc Jaccard is announcing his retirement at the end of 2021. Consistent with his lifelong dedication to the Home, he has volunteered to remain through the end of the year to assist with the search for and transition of leadership to a new Executive Director.
Marc joined the Evans Home in 1995 as Program Manager and over the next three years transitioned to Executive Director as long-time leader Dr. M. Kirby Lloyd retired, knowing the Home was in Marc’s capable hands. Sheriff Lenny Millholland, who has been associated with the home since 1979 and is a long-time board member, remarks ‘We hated it when we had to say goodbye to Kirby and now, we find ourselves feeling the same way with Marc. Over the years I have seen Marc mentor, teach, and be a parental figure to the many young people that have gone through the doors at 330 E. Leicester Street.’.
During Marc’s tenure, the Home has provided shelter, care, and love to hundreds of children. For some the Home was a temporary haven while parents navigated life’s challenges and for others the Home was just that: their Home. Marc worked within the local community to see that the Evans Home children are raised with a real sense of family and belonging. Through generous community support they have vacationed as a family in donated beach houses, camped in friends’ back yards, attended donated summer camp sessions and taken sponsored day trips to Kings Dominion. Marc saw that the children obtained jobs and, as they transitioned out of the Home into the working world, ensured that they were afforded vehicles (generously donated), offered tuition-free college education, offered post-high school living accommodations, and, importantly, given the tools necessary to grow into and enjoy happy and fulfilling lives. Many of the children consider Marc family. He has felt fortunate to fill that role. On occasion he has given the bride away at a former resident’s wedding and attended the graduation of another as she was handed her Doctor of Medicine degree.
Enabled by the support of local philanthropists, including Luciana and Robert Duval and Beverley Shoemaker, who share his mission to improve the lives of children in need, Marc saw the Evans Home through financially tough times. In 2013, he led the Home through a transition from an alternative placement for foster care children to an organization that opens its doors to any child in need, including those privately placed by parents who have no safe alternatives. In the last five years one of the greatest financial challenges has been losing government funding for congregate care facilities. Despite this challenge, and thanks in great part to Marc’s contagious enthusiasm for helping children, the Evans Home is fully functional today, relying solely on the support of the generous community it is fortunate to be a part of. Former Winchester Mayor Liz Minor remarks ‘Having served on the Evans Home board for many years, I have been able to observe Marc’s ability to handle the many facets of his position and have always been amazed of the schedule he keeps. His dedication, sincere love and care for every child that comes through the door of the Evans Home is insurmountable. There are simply no words to express how very much he will be missed by all’.
One of Marc’s most ambitious goals was to grow the endowment so that the Evans Home can keep its doors open even in the toughest financial times, times when the Home is most needed. During his tenure, the endowment has grown tenfold. The interest it now generates provides support for two children living full time at the Home for a year. If you would like to honor Marc’s service to the Home, donating to the endowment so that it can support additional children is a wonderful way to do that (see www.evanshome.org 'How to Help' section for more information).
Perhaps the most telling sign of Marc’s success is the return on a regular basis of former residents who come to share their life stories, show their appreciation for the Home and support it themselves. As both a parent and the Executive Director, this is the legacy Marc fought for and enabled.
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