You Are The Mission

URM Charging Guests a Fee?

I first became aware of the idea to allow guests to participate in their eventual transition out of homelessness by paying a proportion of the cost of their program when I walked into the Door of Faith Mission in Des Moines, Iowa, over 24 years ago. 

The Door of Faith was an interesting place, because it had been established by a man, George Holloway, who had himself experienced homelessness and missions for 37 years.  He did not like what he had experienced, so he established a Mission that welcomed men, fed them extremely well to make them feel good and help avoid addictions, expected and enforced sobriety, allowed them to stay in all day or rest on their bunk when they were not working, and required them to either work or utilize their income to pay a portion of their own way, $6.00 per day back then, because he believed men would feel better about themselves if they paid their own way and carried their own weight. 

This allowed for a good working model of a mission, as 1/3 of the operating revenue came from supporting churches, 1/3 came from individual donors, and 1/3 came from the men themselves, contributing to their own recovery.  Everything good I learned about running a Mission came from George Holloway, a man with a 3rd grade education, and his successor, Chaplain EE Peters, who taught me how to love someone out of homelessness.  My friend and mentor, John Perkins, the grandfather of Christian Community Development, also has reaffirmed to me that people feel better about themselves when they can pay even a portion of their own way and help themselves.

The only good additions that I made to the Door of Faith philosophy, were to invite people to chapel rather than requiring chapel attendance, and to gradually increase the fee from $6.00 the first month, to $7.00 the 2nd month, and $8.00 the 3rd and final months to gently encourage the men to move on to their own apartments as they became ready. 

I brought this philosophy with me to Union Rescue Mission, but when I mentioned charging guests or allowing them to invest a portion of their income to empower their recovery, it was met with some skepticism, as it was a new way of thinking.  I had just experienced what happens when you bring too many changes too quickly, so I dropped the subject for a few years. 

However, during a staff town hall meeting, the idea came up again.  A front lines staff person, concerned about long time guests who had a substantial income that they were frivolously spending while residing at URM for free, asked, “Why can’t we ask guests with a substantial income to participate by paying portion of the cost to reside here?”  I quickly shared with them that I had thought of that before, and that we would explore it.  

Understand, this question comes from a staff person who is not highly paid, who during this recession has, along with the rest of us, had their pay cut twice by 5%, no longer is receiving a match on their 401K, and is contributing a larger portion towards their health care benefits. Remarkably, even with all of this, about 65% of our staff also donate some of their earnings toward the operations of Union Rescue Mission. They not only give their time, talents, and energy, but some of their own income towards this work and the people they love.  Why wouldn’t we explore allowing guests with substantial income to participate in their own recovery? 

So, we explored the possibility over a number of months.  I blogged about it, and we received fantastic feedback on comments to the blogs.

We met with local community activists who formerly experienced homelessness, and gained valuable insight from them.  We developed from these discussions a pilot program of 25 beds and 25 beds (10% of our total guest beds) that would consist of a covenant relationship with some benefits in return for participation in what we have described as the Gateway Program.  We ask for a commitment to sobriety, ask the guest to pay $7.00 per day – $2.00 to go into their own savings plan, and $5.00 to pay for their specific case management that will assist in empowering them to escape homelessness.  In return, the guests are provided a foot locker for their bunk, their bunk is home to them all day long, they can access their bed and rest any time they like during the day, classes are provided, and they receive the more intense empowering case management that they are themselves investing in. All of the meals, health clinic, dental clinic, mental health counseling, legal clinic, utilities, and a host of other services continue to be provided for free because of the support of donors. 

I need to say it again for clarity: the fees collected will be for personal savings and the guests’ specific case management.  We launched it at first as voluntary, and we have had some volunteer participation, but change does not come easily. So next month we are going to move from 280 free guest beds on the men’s side to 255 free beds and 25 Gateway beds, and from 208 free beds on the womens’ side to 183 free beds and 25 Gateway beds. I personally hope that this program proves so successful that it grows from the inside out. 

There is no question that these hard times have contributed to implementing this philosophy.  We hope to work through these difficult financial times, and allow our guests to participate by investing in their own recovery so that we all come out better on the other side. 

When we implement this plan for our families with an income residing in one of our private rooms, each family will participate by paying 30% of their income in a program fee, 10% will be put towards their savings, and 20% will pay specifically for the case management staff assigned to the families.  This quite likely is the only way URM can continue being one of the only resources for housing single moms with kids, single dads with kids, and two parent families with kids including teen-agers and teen-age boys.  Would it be wiser to close our 4th and 5th floors down due to a lack of resources or is it better to allow families with an income to participate, pay for their own specific case management, and keep the much needed resources available?  

The single moms with children who participate in this program will be the first to have the opportunity to move to our beautiful Hope Gardens Family Center, a fantastic transitional housing facility which also requires participation in a program fee/savings program.  I will ask the question again in closing – with the sacrificial giving by our donors and the dedicated selfless work of our staff, why wouldn’t we explore allowing guests with substantial income to participate in their own recovery? 

Blessings,

Andy

Andre Ethier & Farmer Johns Sponsor Lunch at URM

On Wednesday, we were honored to have the Dodgers’ Andre Ethier and Farmer Johns serving up hot dogs for all the residents at URM!

Thanks to Farmer Johns sponsoring the meal, we were able to serve everyone delicious Farmer John’s hot dogs for lunch!

Andre Ethier helped with the grilling outside, as well as serving to our guests.

The Dodgers were kind enough to provide Dodgers Blankets for everyone, too!

Thank you so much to Andre Ethier, The Dodgers, and Farmer Johns for providing a fun-filled afternoon at URM!

Join Our Day of Service!

Please join us on Saturday, September 11th for our first ever “You Are the Mission Service Day”! We are inviting everyone in LA to roll up their sleeves, come down to Skid Row and make an impact.

This is a great way to exercise Step 2 of our 10 Step Plan to End Homelessness in LA, and recognize the “National 9/11 Day of Service & Remembrance”.

Here’s how you can get involved:

1) Visit www.youarethemission.org
2) Sign up for one of our many service projects
3) Share this event with your friends!

We expect a big turnout, so please sign up as soon as you can! Deadline for all registration is Friday, September 3rd.

Together, let’s end homelessness in LA!

A Most Challenging Time

Last week during an interview with friend and writer for the LA Daily News, Troy Anderson, I shared that the challenge Union Rescue Mission is facing right now is far greater than the challenge URM faced during the Great Depression of the 1930’s.  Troy was startled by this statement and asked “Can you provide statistical data to back that up?” I replied, “Yes, I can.”

I quickly asked our URM historian, Liz Mooradian, to assist me in some research and did some checking of my own.  We learned that there were 1.2 Million people in Los Angeles in 1933, and in our hall of history on our 2nd floor it states that in 1933, URM was one of few Missions in downtown LA, and we fed 42% of the free meals to hungry people in Los Angeles.  That year, we provided 133,145 meals and gave aid (food boxes, job finding assistance, etc.) to 304 families.  All of our history books show that we did not house families during the Great Depression, but housed only men.  Families appear to have either turned to other family members or stayed in tents like my own father’s family did many times during that difficult time as shown in the picture below. 

In 2010, there are 3.6 Million people in Los Angeles, or 3 times the number of people that there were in 1933. Union Rescue Mission served an astounding 1,284,687 meals, or nearly 10 times the number of meals that URM served during that difficult year of 1933 in the midst of the Great Depression.  And when you consider that unlike 1933, Union Rescue Mission is not one of the few Missions in downtown LA anymore, but rather the biggest one of many, the fact that nearly 1.3 Million meals came from URM alone, demonstrates how staggering the situation really is.

During the Great Depression, URM provided 42% of free meals available in LA and 2% of available beds. I am unsure as to what percentage of meals we are providing today, but we are providing nearly 10% of the available beds! Along with a 3 times proportionate challenge on meals, in 2010 URM housed several hundred families over the course of the year and as many as 94 families & 190 children on any given night. 

Please hear the distress and familiarity of the words in our annals from the Great Depression:

After the depression, as after World War I, the financial situation was such that local churches were hard pressed to meet their own budgets and doors once open to the Mission (URM) for monetary appeals were closing.

Business failures increased the numbers of unemployed and distressed who looked to the Mission for assistance. Many who arrived in California thinking it a glorious land of promise found themselves penniless and alone. 

The scope of the Mission’s work in those days was immense; no local church would have dreamed, on such meager resources and with so limited staff, of engaging in such a program.

The final URM note from the Great Depression Days is not necessarily an encouraging one, but one during this great crisis of 2007-2010 that I completely understand:

Mounting financial pressures came to the explosive point in July, 1936. With income insufficient to meet operating expenses and a $19,000 mortgage against the Mission properties, the Board of Directors voted to vacate the position of superintendent (CEO), and with this step Superintendent Eldridge’s services were terminated. 

Now, please hear the distress in my words.  Union Rescue Mission and our families and precious children living here and throughout the USA have never in history faced a greater challenge than the one we are facing right now.  Children under the age of 18 now make up 54% of people experiencing homelessness! 

Here are just a few headlines from around the country:

Family homelessness rising in the United States- http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE4AB18I20081112

Shocker! More Families Are Homeless- http://homelessness.change.org/blog/view/shocker_more_families_are_homeless

Increase in family homelessness impact children the most –http://www.examiner.com/x-25447-LA-Unemployment-Examiner~y2009m10d22-Increase-in-family-homelessness-impact-children-the-most

More Families Are Becoming Homeless-http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/11/AR2009071102099.html

Over and above URM’s heroic efforts during the Great Depression, our team at Union Rescue Mission and I, with your help,  have boldly stepped up to the challenge of welcoming every family who has come to our doors over the last 3 years. We desperately need your continued support. We are committed to making sure no child is left on the streets of our city. No child should ever suffer from the devastation of homelessness.  My father did, and the pain of that experience stayed with him and he shared it with me in his final days while he was on his death bed.  He told me that at the age of 4 he hung onto his Dad’s neck for his life as his Dad jumped on a freight car to move to California. He had several homeless experiences when he was 4, 9 and 14.  He is pictured below, at age 14, standing outside of his “home”, a tent in Azusa Canyon, California.  He lived in tents, garages, sheds, even cars and freight cars at times.

My dad’s eyes welled up with tears every time he discussed the pain and embarrassment of being homeless.  I believe his pain is a part of what drives me.  I see my Dad in each and every one of the precious kids who we are honored to serve here at URM.  Please continue to support us so that we can continue to step up to the need and welcome each person who comes to us. 

Much love, Andy B.

Chick-Fil-A Provides Lunch at URM!

 

Today, URM guests enjoyed delicious chicken sandwiches for lunch thanks to the popular restaurant Chick-Fil-A.

We are honored that Chick-fil-A  has selected Union Rescue Mission as the launch site to celebrate their new restaurant that just opened in Los Angeles. As CEO Andy Bales said, “We are looking forward to developing a long-term relationship with an organization like Chick-fil-A that shares the same values as URM.”

 

You Saved Hope Gardens!

Just a few months ago, we were facing one of the worst crises we’ve ever had – the possibility that we might have to close down our Hope Gardens Family Center. Thankfully, many generous donors stepped up to the need and helped us raise $3.8 million, even more than our original goal! To celebrate and thank those who played a crucial part in saving Hope Gardens, we threw a party last weekend, thanks in part to generous sponsorship from Home Depot and Dandy Don’s Ice Cream. Guests were able to tour Hope Gardens, and meet the moms and children that they saved from returning to the streets of Skid Row.

We hope you will please take a minute to check out this video of highlights from the event, and to hear from one of our loyal volunteers, NCIS’ Pauley Perette!

I Have to Admit…

 

I have to admit, this is the 1st day in over 5 years when I was not eager to come into work at Union Rescue Mission.  My eyes welled up with tears as I drove up to my parking place this morning. Tears streamed as I signed the severance checks and good-bye letters to 11 of our faithful co-workers.

As I write, there is a man on the streets of Skid Row outside, deeply troubled, and yelling at the top of his lungs about the circumstances of his world. This morning, I completely understand his anger. 

This is the letter that each of our departing heroic co-workers received this morning:

 

It is with great sorrow that I let you know that due to necessary budget cuts; Union Rescue Mission has been forced to remove your position and end your time as an employee of Union Rescue Mission. 

Our Board of Directors gave us a mandate to present a balanced budget, and after a couple of attempts, we finally did.  Although I was thankful that we could save Union Rescue Mission and keep Hope Gardens open while presenting a balanced budget, I was deeply anguished over what this meant for you and other valuable members of our team. 

This round of reductions is the one that hurts the very most.  We had to go painfully deep in hopes that this will be the final round of lay-offs. We have to release employees who have not only done their job, but employees who have performed their duties very well. We have had to let go of cherished former graduates, grads who we are very proud of, from our very own URM program who have been doing a very good job.  This really hurts, and what hurts the most is how this affects you and your family.  I personally apologize that this has happened on my watch.  I have spent many sleepless nights, including last night, trying to figure out another way. I am so sorry.

Thank you, for your diligent efforts.  Thank you, for sharing your time and talent with our guests and staff. Thank you, for your personal sacrifice, taking the pay reductions, losing your 401K match, stepping up to help with your benefits, and still showing up every day to give your best.  This decision is not about you or your performance, but is all about the economy and the difficult times.

Your sacrifice and efforts will not be forgotten.  Your story and commitment will forever be written on our wall of history, part of the group that stepped up in 2007-2010 to serve even 3 times the need that URM experienced during the Great Depression.  Unfortunately, this Great Recession continues to challenge us and has led us to this heart-wrenching decision today.   

Union Rescue Mission and I will be praying for you and hoping for nothing but the best. You are always welcome to stop by, visit, and perhaps volunteer.  We will always welcome you as an honored guest.

 

Friends, please keep each one of these, our precious former co-workers in your prayers.  Keep URM and our guests in your prayers.  One of the ways that I made it through the weekend, barely made it through the weekend, was to not only grieve this loss, but to also thank God that somehow in His grace and goodness he allowed URM and Hope Gardens to continue on, and He allowed you and I to keep our jobs during this difficult time. Know as well, that receiving this letter means that you have done a remarkable job during this difficult time and that you are absolutely essential to the ongoing operations of URM and Hope Gardens Family Center.  Please take time to grieve, but take some time to give thanks as well. 

We will hold a Town Hall after Chapel today to de-brief about these difficult budget decisions and how to proceed this next fiscal year.

Bless you,  Andy B.

Talent Show Packs the House!

Last night, the  Servant Leadership group hosted a URM Talent Show.  The Servant Leaders are program men and women who choose to commit beyond the regular program commitments. Wanting to do something fun to lighten everyone’s spirit, they chose to organize a Talent Show. This was no easy task – but proved to be a great idea; the Chapel was standing room only for the show!

The evening began with the Servant Leadership praise team singing two numbers, and giving a warm welcome to the completely full Chapel of guests! The performances were all wonderful, and included a barbershop quartet, spoken word, praise dancing, many soloists, a hilarious skit, and Christian rapping.

Not only did the crowd get to enjoy the talents of others, but the performers really enjoyed being able to share their gifts. It was a fun-filled evening – we are already looking forward to the next one!

Both And

I believe that advocates for people experiencing homelessness have made a big mistake in taking sides in the Housing First struggle, pushing for an either/or approach to responding to and ending homelessness in the U.S.

This news article from Columbia, South Carolina also spells out the problem:

Columbia Phasing Out Backing of Homeless Project

By ADAM BEAM,  McClatchy Newspapers

http://www.thestate.com/

COLUMBIA, S.C. – Columbia is phasing out its support for Housing First, the program that places the chronically homeless into permanent housing scattered throughout the city.

The program, which began in 2007, is operated by the University of South Carolina School of Medicine and the Columbia Housing Authority. Its contract expired in June but was renewed for another year.

But with a shrinking budget, council members have asked Housing First officials to begin looking elsewhere for the $247,166 it takes to run the program.

Housing First was a shift in the city’s homeless strategy, focusing on placing the homeless in private, permanent housing around the city instead of concentrating all of its homeless services on one comprehensive shelter.

But Housing First targets the chronically homeless, defined by the federal department of Housing and Urban Development as people who have been continuously homeless for a year or more or who have had four instances of homelessness in the past three years. It does not serve the larger temporary homeless population – folks who find themselves suddenly homeless after a job loss or an accident.

For that reason, the city has begun shifting its money back to a homeless shelter-based approach.

It continues to operate a $500,000 winter homeless shelter and has agreed to contribute $250,000 to the Midlands Housing Alliance, which is building an $11.7 million homeless center. Council members say they can no longer afford the money it takes to place Housing First’s clients into permanent housing.

“We’d love to, but you can’t serve as many people with Housing First,” Councilwoman Tameika Isaac Devine said. “We still have an obligation to provide the winter shelter.”

While Housing First is expensive, it avoids one of the major pitfalls of homeless services by not having a homeless shelter. Instead, clients are placed in apartments evenly divided among the city’s four council districts. That’s a big selling point for local residents, who often oppose homeless shelters near their neighborhoods.

Most homeless services operate by first providing homeless people with job training, health care and mental health counseling before the ultimate goal of transferring them to permanent housing. But Housing First is the opposite, providing the permanent housing first, followed by the other services.

“We actually find that by providing housing first, you end up with people being clean and sober and people with employment and people with income and people with health care,” said David Parker, University of South Carolina’s director of research and assistant professor at the Department of Medicine who runs the Housing First program.

Since its inception, Housing First has placed 54 people into permanent housing. Of the 54, the average time they were homeless is eight years, Parker said.

The Columbia Housing Authority works to place the clients into permanent housing and train them on how to live in a house.

“The first person we moved in was 15 years on the streets. He doesn’t know how to clean an oven,” said Nancy Stoudenmire with the Columbia Housing Authority.  Currently, the program has 20 people in apartments throughout the city. Thirteen of them are paying a portion of the rent, Stoudenmire said.

Eight clients have successfully transitioned out of the program into independent housing, Parker said. They include a woman whose Housing First apartment was originally furnished by another local nonprofit organization.

“She was so grateful to that nonprofit for (buying the furniture) – she basically made a donation that would cover furniture for somebody else’s apartment,” Parker said. “We get to see a completely different side of homeless people than is often publicized.”

As for the future of the program, Parker and Stoudenmire say they are trying to find grant money to keep it going, including pursuing funding from the Tenant Based Rental Assistance Program.

If it is able to survive, Parker said Housing First also would help out other homeless service providers in the area.

Read more here.

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I recently saw an opportunity for HOME funds to come down from the Federal Government to LA County, and in the description of the funding it mandated that these funds can only be used for Permanent Housing Opportunities.

At a time when we are facing the biggest need ever, and I mean the biggest need in the history of Union Rescue Mission’s 119 years, even bigger than the Great Depression, this restrictive description of the funding was difficult to hear.  Let me first describe the need. In 1933, there were 1.2 million people residing in L.A., and URM fed 133,000 meals.  Last year, there were 3.6 million people in the City of Angels, and we fed 1.25 million meals!  That is a 3 fold proportionate increase in need and services, and we are just 1 of many missions/shelters today, rather than being one of the only ones as we were in 1933!

We ourselves are struggling with how to divide our resources.  Do we move all of our resources to our Hope Gardens Family Center or keep all of the resources at our downtown URM emergency response?  Do we let public officials cry out Housing First only, move all resources to provide permanent supportive housing for the 20% of people experiencing homelessness who are the most chronically homeless and away from the 80% who are episodically experiencing homelessness or who are experiencing homelessness for the first time?

It may be an easy public policy decision to move all of the resources to Housing First only, but when you are on the ground, facing a tsunami of families with children, including one little 4 year old guy named Dorian, who is struggling with a terminal illness, it is a bit more difficult to make the decision to close the shelters/emergency responses down and move the resources to building only a few permanent housing units compared to the vast need. It is like picking a few drowning victims out of an ocean full of need.

If the full truth be known, in that 80% of people experiencing homelessness, there are many who, if their needs go unmet and they are denied emergency services, will in fact end up as the chronic homeless people of tomorrow.  Studies show that the adults experiencing chronic homelessness today were the children who experienced homelessness and poverty a generation ago.  They were sick twice as often, their self-esteem was hurt, they fell behind in school, they were in and out of foster care, and they became our chronically homeless people. That means that our children today experiencing homelessness will be our chronic homeless adults of the future, unless we quit the either/or approach and take a common sense, aggressive Both And approach like Union Rescue Mission’s own You Are The Mission 10 Step Initiative to end homelessness.

As Columbia, South Carolina realized, you can’t turn your back on the multitudes to help a few, but I believe that unlike Columbia, our decision needs to be to step up and provide the much needed help of permanent supportive housing for the few, while still doing everything we can to address the needs of many, and not let one precious human being experience the brutality of life on the streets.

To read more about this subject, check out this article by Ralph Da Costa Nunez, “One Size Does Not Fit All”

As always, I welcome and appreciate your feedback.

Blessings,

City Council Votes to Donate Food

Today, the LA City Council voted in favor of donating surplus food to food banks, homeless shelters, and other organizations that assist those in need.  During the press conference earlier this morning, Councilman Jose Huizar explained the reasoning for the decision.  “It helps the city reduce waste, and secondly puts food on the tables of families who are going hungry each day here in the city of Los Angeles.”

We are so grateful for this new policy that will help us fulfill some of our needs as we face increasing numbers of people coming to us for meals, shelter, and assistance. As always, we appreciate your continued support – we can’t do it without you!

For more info, click here.