KQED: President Trump’s choice to lead the Department of Housing and Urban Development, retired surgeon Ben Carson, has no experience in housing or homeless services. He’s never held elected office or a government job.
LA Times: He sat on a pillow atop a plastic bucket, crocheting. A man and woman approached. They were agents of the Downtown Center Business Improvement District. He would be their first contact in Pershing Square, which by midmorning was already filling with homeless people, or those who appeared to be.
USC News: Project will explore ways to reduce the gap between the needs of L.A.’s chronically homeless and existing housing and support service options
Having struggled with mental illness her entire life, Evelyn was homeless on and off for 20 years. She occasionally found employment during periods of wellness, only to lose her job again during an episode of illness. When living on the street, Evelyn isolated herself from her adult children so that she wouldn’t burden them with her difficult struggle to survive. “Mental illness can be invisible because you look fine,” said Evelyn. “People can’t see how sick you really are.”
Evelyn was referred to Skid Row Housing Trust’s permanent supportive housing a year and a half ago. Not only does Evelyn now have a safe and stable home, but also a team of onsite staff that work collaboratively to help her address the underlying mental health conditions that led to her being homeless. “If the property manager at my building doesn’t see me for a day, she notices,” said Evelyn. “She’ll stop by my apartment or check-in with my case manager. Everyone is watching out for me.”
For the first few months after she moved into permanent supportive housing, Evelyn rarely left her home because she didn’t trust that it would be there when she returned. Now Evelyn participates in support groups, spends time with her children and grandchildren, and volunteers twice a week at an outreach center for women that helped her while she was homeless.
Your donation will help Skid Row Housing Trust create more homes for men and women experiencing homelessness and increase the supportive services that help residents like Evelyn heal, reconnect, and succeed. By 2020, the Trust will build or renovate 1,200 homes in Los Angeles, and all of them will have on-site staff and programs that help our residents break the cycle of homelessness. We are sincerely grateful for your continued generosity and encourage you to invest in permanent homes and support – the key ingredients to ending homelessness for good.
Give online now at skidrow.org/give.
Evelyn with her son Charles at the Star Apartments.
KCRW Press Play: More than 27,000 people are homeless in Los Angeles. The problem is getting worse. In a special live event, Madeleine Brand looks at how we got here, what at-risk people are doing to keep off the streets, and what big ideas exist to effectively tackle the crisis.
NBC Give visited Skid Row Housing Trust’s Star Apartments. Host Laura Marano surprised staff and residents with a special gift from California Community Foundation!
Landscape Architecture Magazine: Speed bumps and curbs that narrow the street to slow traffic. Safety zones for women and LGBTQ residents. Vegetable gardens with citrus trees. Drinking fountains, storage units, and cell phone charging stations. This isn’t a laundry list of community benefits in your local affluent suburb; it’s a wish list for the nation’s most concentrated homeless community in downtown Los Angeles: Skid Row.
Yesterday morning, I had the great privilege of hosting a broad coalition of elected officials, civic leaders, philanthropic partners, nonprofit service providers, and homeless advocates at Skid Row Housing Trust’s New Genesis Apartments, which gathered to urge Angelenos to vote yes on Proposition HHH on the November 2016 ballot. The proposition – “Housing and Hope to End Homelessness”- would allow the city to finance 10,000 units of permanent supportive housing over the next 10 years. It would triple the rate at which Los Angeles currently builds safe, stable, and affordable housing that is desperately needed by thousands of individuals who are currently homeless.
Permanent supportive housing in Los Angeles has a 90% success rate at ending homelessness, and is 43% cheaper than leaving people on the street where they are dependent on emergency services and temporary shelters for care. Not just an apartment, permanent supportive housing offers voluntary on-site health, mental health, recovery and case management services so that formerly homeless individuals can stabilize their lives on their own terms. Unfortunately, there is not enough housing to help all of those in need, and the waitlist is long. Visit yesonhhh.com to learn how Proposition HHH would dramatically accelerate the work that is being done, bringing this proven solution to scale.
Proposition HHH is a common-sense approach based on evidence and years of hands-on experience: Homes end homelessness. It would bring tens of thousands of our neighbors – men, women, children and veterans – home. We were honored to host the launch of this important campaign, which was covered by the LA Times, KCRW, MyNewsLA, ABC, CBS and many more. Join this historic effort to end homelessness in our City by spreading word and voting yes for Proposition HHH this November.
Mike Alvidrez
CEO, Skid Row Housing Trust
City of Los Angeles CAO Miguel Santana, City Council President Herb Wesson, Councilmember Mike Bonin, Mayor Eric Garcetti, Executive Secretary-Treasurer Los Angeles County Federation of Labor Rusty Hicks, Councilmember Marqueece Harris-Dawson, Councilmember José Huizar, United Way of Greater Los Angeles President and CEO Elise Buik (not pictured), and Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Gary Toebben (not pictured) listen to formerly homeless advocate Sylvia Hernandez stress the urgent need for housing.
KCRW: The Los Angeles City Council is weighing two separate measures to fund solutions to homelessness. One likely applicant for those funds will be the nonprofit developer Skid Row Housing Trust, which has built supportive housing by some of LA’s leading architects. Can good architecture and planning help re-integrate the formerly homeless back into society?