Feel Good Friday - Housing Works

December is HIV/AIDS Awareness Month, making this the perfect time to spotlight Housing Works.

Founded in 1990 and headquartered in New York City, the mission of Housing Works is "to end the dual crises of homelessness and AIDS through relentless advocacy, the provision of lifesaving services, and entrepreneurial businesses that sustain our efforts."

Born from the AIDS activism of four ACT UP members—Keith Cylar, Charles King, Eric Sawyer, and Virginia Shubert—Housing Works emerged during a time when tens of thousands of New Yorkers living with HIV/AIDS were facing homelessness and had nowhere to turn. These founders believed that stable housing was the key to helping HIV-positive people live healthy lives and prevent further spread of the virus.

Since 1990, Housing Works has served more than 30,000 homeless and low-income New Yorkers living with or affected by HIV/AIDS. Their comprehensive services include supportive housing (over 800 units), healthcare through five health centers across the city, mental health and substance use treatment, nutritional counseling, legal assistance, and their Ready For Work program—an eight-week workforce development initiative that provides job training and guarantees employment opportunities for graduates.

What sets Housing Works apart is their pioneering social enterprise model. To sustain their mission while reducing dependence on grants, they operate nine acclaimed thrift shops throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn, the beloved Housing Works Bookstore Cafe in SoHo, and even opened New York State's first legal recreational cannabis dispensary in 2022. Every purchase at these businesses directly funds their lifesaving services.

Their advocacy work is equally powerful. With offices in New York City, Albany, Washington D.C., Haiti, and Puerto Rico, Housing Works fights tirelessly for legislation ensuring all people living with HIV/AIDS have access to quality housing, healthcare, and protection from discrimination.

If you'd like to support Housing Works, there are many ways to do so. You can volunteer at their bookstore, thrift shops, or special events like their annual Design on a Dime benefit. Consider donating items to their thrift shops or bookstore, making a financial contribution, shopping at their retail locations or online store, and amplifying their message on social media. Follow them on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn to stay connected with their work.

Feel Good Friday - Family Promise

Winter weather can be challenging, especially for those who are experiencing homelessness. That’s the inspiration to highlight Family Promise, an organization working to end family homelessness across the United States.

Founded in 1986 and headquartered in Summit, New Jersey, Family Promise “prevents and ends homelessness for families with children and helps them achieve sustainable independence through a community-based response.” 

Family Promise is the largest nonprofit addressing family homelessness in the nation and there is a great need for their services. According to information shared in videos and posts in 2023, 42.9 million households spent more than 30% of their income on housing costs and 21.5 million spent more than 50% of their income on housing. In addition, 3 million children in the United States experience homelessness every year. 

Family Promise has 200 Affiliates in 43 states, staffed by over 180,000 volunteers. Together they run a variety of shelter, prevention, and stabilization programs such as the examples below.

Prevention and diversion programs aim to keep families out of shelters by providing services such as temporary hotel stays, landlord mediation or rental assistance. Emergency shelter is offered on a rotational model which means mobilizing volunteers to help house families in community space. Stabilization programs focus on tenancy training, financial capability and other educational initiatives. Housing programs include master leasing, transitional in place programming, and housing choice vouchers. Finally, when needed local communities organize to provide services such as food pantries, furniture donation and holiday gift drives.

The results from using this holistic approach are impressive. 63,000 families were served in 2023 and over 80% of families in the Family Promise shelter program exit into stable housing.

If you’d like to get involved, look for an affiliate in your community and volunteer. You can also make a monetary donation and help amplify their work by spreading the word on social media. Follow Family Promise on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn.

Feel Good Friday - Win (Women in Need)

On this first Feel Good Friday of Women’s History Month, let’s get to know Win, an organization helping women and children across New York City.

Founded in 1983 as Women in Need, Win began as a shelter for four homeless women and their combined six children. Forty years later, Win is " the largest provider of family shelter and supportive housing in New York City.”

Statistics on their website state that approximately 60% of New Yorkers in shelters are families with children and every night nearly 52,660 people in New York City, including over 17,000 children, go to bed in a homeless shelter. That’s why the vision of Win is “to break the cycle of homelessness by being the premier leader and trusted partner in innovative solutions for families in need.”

Win takes a comprehensive approach to break the cycle of homelessness which they call The Way to Win. It includes over 1,700 units of transitional housing where families stay for an average of 14 months. There are also 330 permanent supportive apartment units that include continued counseling for families with special needs, such as mothers who have aged out of foster care or who are in recovery.

In addition to housing assistance, Win provides childcare; education on life skills such as parenting, financial literacy, healthcare, employment counseling, and interview preparation; and counselors who can address issues such as mental health, domestic violence and substance abuse.

Last year Win served nearly 8,700 homeless people, including 4,700 children, and helped more than 730 families transition from shelters to their own homes. You can read some of their stories at this link. More recently, the New York City Council just passed Win-authored legislation which “requires the city to fund mental health clinicians at every shelter for homeless families with children, providing the support parents and children need and deserve, directly where they live.”

If you’d like to support the women and children Win serves you can attend an event, volunteer your time or donate your money. As always, I encourage you to amplify their work on social media. Follow Win on Facebook, on Twitter @WINNYC_ORG and on Instagram @winnyc_org. 

Feel Good Friday - Building Futures with Families

The rainy weather in the Bay Area this week made me grateful to have a home and curious to know who is helping our unhoused neighbors. That led me to today’s Feel Good Friday organization, Building Futures with Families.

What started in 1986 as The San Leandro Refuge for Women and Children is now Building Futures with Families. Their mission is “to build communities with underserved individuals and families, where they are safely and supportively housed, free from homelessness and domestic violence.”

Building Futures runs several homeless shelters across Alameda County, California. Some are warming shelters which open up when cold weather or rain is predicted. They offer a warm bed for the night, dinner, breakfast and a connection to housing services. Others are full-service shelters offering a warm bed, three meals a day, shower and laundry facilities, access to computers and telephones as well as permanent supportive housing assistance, linkage to medical services, financial literacy classes and children’s programming. Information on the specific locations and additional resources on homelessness can be found here.

Services for survivors of domestic violence include a safe house, which provides shelter and support services, and weekly support groups for both women and men survivors of intimate partner violence. For those who don’t need shelter services, there is an outreach team that provides advocacy, case management, counseling, and is also available for public education workshops. To access any of these services as well as find resources on domestic violence dynamics, safety planning and boundary setting guides for teens, click this link.

The final program focus is on supportive housing. Building Families has been a “Housing First” agency since 2007, which means their priority is to quickly connect their clients with housing. They do this by running a 52-unit permanent supportive housing community in Alameda as well as partnering with other agencies in the county to place people in permanent housing.

In the last year, as noted in the 2019-2020 Annual Report, Building Families has provided 29,883 nights of shelter, served 84,274 meals and housed 394 adults and children. You can read the stories behind the numbers at this link. 

If you’d like support Building Families you can volunteer your time, donate your money and amplify their work on social media by liking their Facebook page and following them on Twitter @buildingfuture5.