LoudounExtra.com

County Program Offers Financial Counseling

By Kameel Stanley

Saturday, July 5, 2008

Guy Johnson is no financial guru. But in the past year, he has helped nearly 50 Loudoun County families balance their checkbooks, improve credit scores and navigate the foreclosure landscape.

Johnson is in charge of the Loudoun Volunteer Financial Council, a program run by the county's extension office. It's a job description the trained sociologist, caseworker and singer never thought he would add to his résumé.

“I always knew I would be in a job helping people, but I never thought it would be this,” said Johnson, who got the coordinator job a year ago.

Guy Johnson is the coordinator for the Loudoun County Volunteer Financial Council, a free program that helps residents learn money management skills.

Johnson and his team of 27 volunteers provide free, anonymous financial counseling to the county's residents.

The process begins with a 11/2-hour session that covers matters such as lifestyle habits and income brackets. A custom one-year spending plan is drawn up, and participants get a personal counselor who sees them through the process.

“We help the residents of Loudoun County get their financial house in order,” Johnson said. “What I found is, how you manage your money is how you manage your life.”

Last month, through a partnership with the Virginia Foreclosure Prevention Task Force and the Virginia Housing Development Authority, Johnson had a title added to his job: foreclosure prevention counselor.

He helped with a clinic for residents June 21 at Chantilly High School.

But teaching people how to manage their money during crises is something Johnson and his team dealt with long before the official certification process.

The financial counseling program has been operating in Loudoun for more than 20 years, and more than 1,000 people have been in the program.

Beverly Samuels, senior extension agent for family and consumer science, founded the program in 1985. Families had been going to the county for help, but their incomes were too high to qualify them for traditional assistance, she said.

“They weren't poor enough to receive assistance from social services, but they still couldn't adequately live within their means in Loudoun County,” Samuels said.

The financial council tried to fill that gap and grew steadily, she said.

In 1998, the program helped at least 40 families being displaced from subsidized, low-income housing in Leesburg.

But by the turn of the century, the low-key program was in a slump. Attracting and retaining volunteers became harder, Samuels said.

Last summer, when Johnson came onboard, the program got an overhaul.

“For the general community, I think we still have a lot of work to do in terms of penetration,” Samuels said. “We want to get families before they get in trouble.”

Volunteers such as Marcus White are integral to that process, Johnson said.

“It's taught me that this is a much more widespread problem,” said White, a former Marine and congressional aide who runs a commercial lending business.

In light of the economic issues plaguing the country, financial literacy is increasingly important, he said.

“It's really an important thing, how we manage our money,” White said. “Sometimes it's the basics, but the basics is what we're missing.”

Because of that, White said, he often encourages his clients to include their children in the counseling sessions. It's his way of ensuring that the next generation will have the tools to manage money, he said.

While the program thrives, Johnson is preparing to beef up his staff to deal with the expected increase in needs related to the national housing crisis.

“I know we're going to be inundated,” he said. “People still have more bills than Benjamins.”