Eimago

Winter Shelters: Glendale

Since December 1st, the LA county Winter Shelters have been providing assistance, meals, and housing for those experiencing homelessness all around the Los Angeles area.

Looking for a safe haven from the winter cold, the rainy weather, and hopelessness of living in a situation of homelessness, hundreds of people have found the EIMAGO shelters. EIMAGO is a Union Rescue Mission subsidiary, who has worked with the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority to provide four additional shelters for the winter months. These shelters will be closing March 15th, a recent worry on many guests’ minds.

The Glendale winter shelter has been a place called home by over a hundred people these past months. Over this past weekend, numbers were higher than usual due to the rainy nights. Having decided to never turn anyone away, the shelter provided beds to over 200 individuals Saturday night.

Dinner was also served to an over-capacity crowd with the help of volunteers, people who dedicate many nights each week to this particular shelter.

Return back tomorrow for some stories of those currently calling Glendale Winter Shelter their home.

Project Restart Kicks Off With Open House

Union Rescue Mission and its affiliate Eimago, Inc. unite in a

historic partnership between the City and the County of Los Angeles

 

Through a new grant program administered by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, Eimago has transformed a triplex and duplex generously donated by the City of Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency.  The project is designed to provide emergency housing for nine families that are experiencing homelessness.  Operations are being funded by the County of Los Angeles for the sole purpose of getting vulnerable families off of the dangerous streets of Skid Row and into a safe family environment.

 

Come celebrate the launch of Project Restart with an Open House and tour. The Project Restart Emergency Housing Program provides an environment that promotes healing for families experiencing homelessness.

 

Project Restart Open House and Barbeque

Thursday, May 13th 2010

4:00 pm – 6:00 pm

2528 Orange Drive, Los Angeles 90016

Families in this unique program are placed in safe housing away from the precarious streets of Skid Row where support staff will assist them in getting back on their feet. The mission is to provide a wide range of supportive case management, housing advocacy, employment assistance, children’s tutoring and after-school programs, along with other needed services, to remove the obstacles for these vulnerable families so they can rapidly return to permanent independent housing. Partnerships with a variety of other service providers both on-site and in the community make a way for educational support, financial management, medical, dental, legal, life skills training and mental health support.

 

From Andy Bales, CEO of Eimago and the Union Rescue Mission, “This program is a historic partnership between the City and the County.  We need more often to see these two bodies come together in one accord to tackle a problem like homelessness.  This is a complex issue and it takes a village.  We need more opportunities where community based organizations, faith-based organizations and all facets of local government come together with a common purpose to say ‘together we are stronger and we can solve homelessness, one family at a time’.”

 

Union Rescue Mission

Since 1891 The Union Rescue Mission (URM) has been providing a variety of services to those who find themselves homeless and impoverished in Los Angeles.  URM’s subsistence services are delivered free of charge to those in need and without any requirements – providing emergency programs that offer food, showers, hygiene items, mail services and shelter.  For those seeking a program of reintegration, URM provides recovery programs for men, women and children using education, job training, counseling, legal assistance, twelve-step programs, transitional housing, medical care, dental services, healthy meals, safe shelter and clean clothing. In June 2007, Hope Gardens Family Center opened in Sylmar – an innovative solution for families transitioning from homelessness. 

Eimago, Inc.

Eimago is a public benefit corporation and a strategic partner with the Union Rescue Mission building on its 118 years of service to men, women, and children experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles. Eimago works with public sector agencies and funding to extend the continuum of care for the clients at URM and similar agencies serving those who find themselves homeless.

 

Leveraging provides additional programs that offer sustainability and longer-term care beyond emergency shelter for targeted populations, such as those who find themselves homeless, the addicted, those released from incarceration, veterans, the elderly and low income families.

Please Help Keep the Winter Shelters Open!!

Today marked the end of our Glendale Winter Shelter, and on March15th, the remaining shelters will be closing as well. Unfortunately, the money that funds the armories will run out then, which means that the 670 people who have been staying at the Winter Shelters will have no place to go.

We would like to ask you to please be an advocate for those who are experiencing homelessness, and consider contacting government officials to keep the Winter Shelters open year round.  The number of people walking through our doors has continued to increase; we don’t ever want to see the day when we have to turn someone away.  Keeping the Winter Shelters open would ensure that we would not have to.

Please go to http://youarethemission.org/advocate. We are asking people to send a pre-written letter to Governor Schwarzenegger to help keep these shelters open by declaring a State of Emergency.  Then, contact the LA City Council, LA County Supervisors, and Los Angeles Housing Services Authority (LAHSA) to support our efforts. With your help, we can bring about a change!  Thank you so much for your support.

 

 

PHC 2009 Serves Over 700 Guests!

 

Most days the Union Rescue Mission is bustling with people and activities – people coming and going all day long looking for supportive services.  But on December 10th, 2009, the ground floor of the Union Rescue Mission (URM) was even more active than usual – full to the brim with guests, volunteers, local partner agencies, helpful staff, and a whole host of new Skid Row neighbors experiencing homelessness.

On this day, URM joined with many of our city, county and private partners to host the Project Homeless Connect Day (PHC) 2009, in alliance with the National Initiative coordinated by the White House Interagency Council on Homelessness.  The purpose of this LA County sponsored event was to bring together service providers, agencies and other local organizations to provide housing, hospitality, information, health-care and many other invaluable services for friends in the midst of homelessness.   PHC is not only a service fair, or an information and referral event, it is an innovative one-day *consumer-focused* one-stop.

Our downtown site hosted a large-scale collaboration of over 40 downtown Los Angeles area service providers, service organizations, businesses and residents to provide area homeless and working poor access to the assistance they need to become self-sufficient and to ultimately obtain affordable housing. At our downtown site, we served over 700 guests, with the help of over 280 volunteers and community friends.  Services included legal aid, service referrals, medical attention, flu shots, mammograms, birth certificates, ID cards and transitional housing.  Practical needs were met as well by providing hygiene kits, warm blankets, bus tokens, free books, and a hot lunch, all in a fun atmosphere with plenty of musical entertainment throughout the day.

Project Homeless Connect 2009 was a great success – uniting our downtown community, strengthening our partnerships, sharing our gifts and providing much-needed services to bless those who we have the privilege of serving.  Special thanks to everyone who pitched in and served so joyfully that day. We couldn’t have done it without you!

Armory unavailable for shelter next year

Christopher Cadelago of Burbank Leader writes that the National Guard Armory in Burbank, which has served as a Winter Shelter site for the homeless, will not not be available next winter season.  Burbank neighbors express enthusiasm that the shelter will not be returning.
March 30, 2009
Many thankful Burbank won’t host winter shelter again.

BURBANK — City officials and neighbors of the National Guard Armory, which for the past two winters has hosted a homeless shelter, breathed a collective sigh of relief Monday after learning that the armory would be unavailable for at least one year.

The National Guard plans to deploy both military units operating out of the Burbank armory to the Middle East this summer for about one year, Sgt. Major Lawrence Ellsworth said last week. Activated armories are unavailable to the public.

“We welcome the fact that the homeless shelter will not be returning next year and, honestly, we hope that, considering our opposition, they will stay away forever,” said Armando Perez, a shelter neighbor who has spoken out against its operator, the Union Rescue Mission of Los Angeles and EIMAGO Inc. “We’re scared. We absolutely need to protect our children and the sanctity of our families. That can’t happen when parents don’t allow their children to go to the park because of what they experienced.”

“First, we must clearly define what we mean by a ‘winter homeless shelter,’” he said. “It would seem that providing shelter from brief periods of inclement weather is fundamentally different than providing a full-service facility for the chronically homeless who may be struggling with addiction, mental illness, or who otherwise find themselves indigent.”

Carrie Gatlin, vice president of government relations and special projects for the Union Rescue Mission, on Tuesday will present a closeout report to the Burbank City Council, which gives details about the 549 transient clients served by the shelter from Dec. 1 to March 15.

The shelter — made up of 179 volunteers — placed 22 individuals and 10 families in transitional or permanent housing in 2008-09. Police responded to the facility 22 times, resulting in three arrests and two transports for mental health. Eight registered sex offenders made their way onto the facility and were later referred out, according to the report.