Hello, dear friends and supporters of Union Rescue Mission. My name is Richard Newcomb. I am the Vice President of Philanthropy at the Union Rescue Mission, and it is my honor and privilege to address you on the end-of-the-month video. We were blessed with our Interim CEO and President Mr. Jeff Hudson, who did an amazing job over the last 10 months. He served us well, guiding our leadership and the Mission. We are so grateful for his leadership, time, and talent to help collaborate with our leadership team at URM and we wish him the best.
We will be providing information in the coming weeks about our new President and new CEO. We’re super excited about the new team coming in to lead URM, so please stay tuned. We’ll communicate more via email and in our September Newsletter. In the meantime, we are answering the call here at Union Rescue Mission. It’s been a challenging year if you’ve been paying attention to the news reports. The homeless count came out at the end of June from the city and the county. The good news is the numbers did not go up for the first time in over a decade. Last year they were 75,500, the new count shows they dropped by about a quarter percent to 75,300. It’s only 200 precious souls, but at least we have plateaued. Maybe.
With more and more precious souls left on the streets here in Los Angeles County, URM has tried to answer the call. We welcomed in over 7,500 people in the past year—that’s 10% of the entire homeless population. We do this without government support for our general operating budget, so we can’t do this work without you. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for all your support. There are no words for us to share our gratitude for your help with this challenging work on Skid Row—and at our other two locations at Angeles House in South L.A. and Hope Gardens in Sylmar.
Last night in all three locations, we sheltered about 1300 human beings. Nearly 900 were moms, dads, and kids, and 150 were seniors. Who’s doing that in L.A. County without government support? I don’t think you’ll find it anywhere else. Our fiscal year ended on June 30th and the financial numbers came out just a few days ago. I am pleased to report that 86 cents of every dollar donated to Union Rescue Mission has gone to life-transforming programs to help people get back to a self-sustaining and successful life. We have a perfect 100 rating from Charity Navigator in every category, including impact and results. Many nonprofits don’t even publish this information. So, you can trust that we are doing great things with the support and the dollars that you send our way.
And we have the ambition to do more, but we need more of Los Angeles to step forward to join the cause. So, we have chosen to spend less on mail and spend more on other channels. In the weeks and months ahead, a new campaign is coming out called Just Help 1. Mother Teresa famously said, “If you can’t feed 100 people, then feed just one.” And it is with this sentiment and vision that we are rallying Los Angeles to wrap their arms around this problem and not give up hope because the numbers seem insurmountable. We want to engage Angelenos to become part of the solution because there are 17 million people in the Metropolitan Los Angeles area. 17 million.
What if each one of us or each family or each household stepped up and helped just one person, even if it’s $30 a month. If we all rally together, that can make a huge difference. So, you’ll see the Just Help 1 campaign on billboards scattered around Los Angeles County: What if we all just help one with an image of one senior lady, one homeless man, one family, and one child. We hope this will help the city become more aware of Union Rescue Mission’s work and look for ways to engage; to not give up hope in the fight against homelessness here in LA County despite the huge numbers.
We’re also partnering with iHeart Media on seven of their radio stations starting in mid-September to rally Los Angeles to Just Help 1. The DJs are going to join our Over the Edge event as part of the Just Help 1 Challenge. We’d like for you to embrace the Just Help 1 Challenge too and join us on September 27th and 28th at the Universal Hilton Hotel in Universal City right above the 101 Freeway. I’ve done it eight times—it’s a bucket list experience to rappel off the 25th floor of the hotel to help raise money to fight homelessness.
Many of the DJs and talent at iHeart Media and KABC Radio will be taking the leap with us. We hope you’ll embrace the challenge. You’ll hear us on the radio, you will see us on billboards. Please tell your friends about our worthy work. Please rally people in your circle of influence to be a part of what we’re doing, to not give up the fight, and to join us in this effort to Just Help 1. Thank you for your support and we hope to see you at Over the Edge on September 27th and 28th.
God bless you,
Richard Newcomb