Donor Recognition
By Founder and Executive Director, Ruth Schwartz
We have also been proactive in developing grant proposals on behalf of the City and the County and the agencies that are on the front-line of serving the homeless. Over the last 15 years, Shelter Partnership has helped secure more than $800 million in funding for the homeless in our community.
Shelter Partnership was established in 1985 as a result of a community planning process, which determined that there needed to be an organization that worked throughout Los Angeles County to help develop housing and resources for the growing number of homeless people who were becoming more visible in our communities. While many community groups had good intentions, there was a lack of expertise (which continues to exist today) in the nuts and bolts of housing development as well as program development that would ultimately stymie the community’s creativity and resourcefulness and act as a barrier to realizing a significant increase in housing opportunities for people who were homeless. The late Dennis Albaugh, then of United Way, and a founding board member of Shelter Partnership, convened the planning efforts for this new initiative. Ann Reiss Lane, appointed by the late Mayor Bradley to the Fire Commission, represented the Mayor and went on to serve as the Chairperson of the newly created organization—Shelter Partnership, Inc.
Beginning that first day, we started providing technical assistance to community-based agencies assisting the homeless.
By early 1985, the community leadership was in place with the late Mayor Tom Bradley; then Mayor of the Board of Supervisors, Edmund Edelman; and past United Way President Frances McNamara, united in their determination to launch Shelter Partnership under their respective auspices. On March 3rd, 1985, we opened our doors with only $5,000 in the bank and free office space donated to us by SRO Housing Corp.
Beginning that first day, we started providing technical assistance to community-based agencies assisting the homeless. The first order of business was to help these agencies apply for State funding that had just become available under its Emergency Shelter Grant program. We continue in that role to this day, providing strategic assistance to community-based organizations to secure public and private funding, that has resulted in more than a quadrupling in the number of beds in the short-term homeless system. We have worked with community groups developing housing for a significant diversity of the homeless populations—including families and victims of domestic abuse; persons with chronic health conditions, including mental illness, HIV/AIDS, physical disabilities, and substance abuse disorders; youth; veterans; and older adults.
We have also provided considerable assistance in helping to increase the permanent, supportive affordable housing system in Los Angeles, as increasing permanent housing with supportive services is essential to ending homelessness, especially for individuals with chronic health conditions. In the last eight years, 3,865 housing units have become available, with more than 360 units coming on line in the last year alone! Working with such exemplary organizations as A Community of Friends, Beyond Shelter, Corporation for Supportive Housing, Homes for Life Foundation, Project New Hope, South Central Housing and Rehabilitation Program, SRO Housing Corp., and Skid Row Housing Trust, Shelter Partnership has helped expand the permanent housing system for homeless families with children, as well as homeless adults. We have also worked very closely with our local housing authorities and homeless social service providers to greatly expand the funding for essential operating subsidies to pay the rent of existing housing units for people who are homeless and sometimes have incomes as low as $2,700 a year!
Shelter Partnership has been concerned with public policy and its impact on the social service and housing delivery systems since our inception. This was evidenced during our first year when Shelter Partnership sponsored, with the leadership of then-Los Angeles City Council President Pat Russell, the first shelter-zoning ordinance of its kind. The ordinances allow programs of 30 beds or less “by right” in appropriate areas of the City of Los Angeles.
However, too few local governments in our region actually allow such programs anywhere in their cities. Following an analysis that Shelter Partnership undertook in 2005 of all of the 88 cities local zoning ordinances in Los Angeles County, State Senator Gilbert Cedillo introduced legislation to require all cities in the State to address the needs of the homeless for emergency, transitional, and permanent supportive housing. Effective January 1st, 2008, the legislation, which is popularly known as SB 2, became law. With community involvement, we are working with more than a dozen local cities to assure that they meet both the spirit and intent of the law.
Consistent with our mission to greatly increase the housing resources for the homeless, Shelter Partnership produces well-recognized ongoing critical analyses and studies of the needs of the various homeless sub-populations and the resources available to serve them. These analyses are widely used by local and national public policy makers, government officials, community-based agencies, and the media.
In February 2009, Shelter Partnership released Is Mixed-Population Housing a Solution to Homelessness? This report is the result of case studies, including interviews, tenant focus groups, and site visits, of five affordable housing developments in California and New York that have at least one-third of the units reserved for formerly homeless families and individuals. This report is intended to further the understanding of developers, social service agencies, property managers, and public officials on the efficacy of developing mixed-population housing specifically for both formerly homeless and low-income households.
The findings are compelling. Well-designed projects with appropriate on-site services provide a healthy living environment for both low-income households and formerly homeless families and individuals. We found that the mixed-population approach has advantages in both their development and financing. Perhaps most significantly, we found that formerly homeless and general population tenants get along well as neighbors; of all the questions for which we sought answers in this study, this one was answered most emphatically and consistently. Shelter Partnership staff has presented the findings locally, at the state level, and at the national conferences where the groundbreaking findings have generated a great deal of interest, which we believe will lead to considerable experimentation and replication of the mixed population model.
In March 2008, Shelter Partnership released its Homeless Older Adults Strategic Plan, a result of a 21-month planning process that identified a growing and significant need to address the issues faced by the over 62 year-old population. On any given night in Los Angeles County, there are 3,000 to 4,000 individuals over-62 years of age who are homeless; one-third are women; and 28% report prior military service, which is twice as high as the general homeless population. Interestingly, more than 60% report having some disability—the majority of those physical. And even though almost two-thirds receive income from either federal Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or Social Security, they are still homeless. Clearly, these individuals need both social service support and permanent supportive housing if we are to break their cycle of homelessness.
On any given night in Los Angeles County, there are 3,000 to 4,000 individuals over-62 years of age that are homeless, one-third are women, and 28% report prior military service, which is twice as high as the general homeless population. Interestingly, more than 60% report having some disability—the majority of those physical.
Shelter Partnership has committed to make this a reality through two major strategies. One is to promote the development of permanent supportive housing focused solely on homeless older adults. When we began work on the Homeless Older Adults Strategic Plan, there were no developments in Los Angeles targeting homeless older adults. Through our implementation of the Plan, City officials in Los Angeles were persuaded to target this population in the City’s Permanent Supportive Housing Program funding. With that change, and informed by the Plan itself, six developments are now in development with 170 units reserved for homeless older adults.
We are also implementing the Plan’s recommendation to overcome application, screening, and wait list barriers in affordable housing for older adults, such as in HUD Section 202s and Section 8 senior buildings, by developing linkages between homeless services providers with administrators of affordable senior housing. Shelter Partnership has facilitated many meetings among affordable housing providers, emergency and transitional housing operators, mental health agencies and other homeless service providers. To date, 58 homeless applicants in eight affordable senior housing buildings and two other buildings have now moved into their own units. Without our work, only a handful of these tenancies would have occurred. As a result of this pilot, we hope to triple that number next year!
Between 2005 and 2007 we completed eight other studies that have helped inform and change policy and resulted in more than $200 million in commitments of new public investment for housing for the homeless. These include:
In part as a result of the Emergency Shelter System study, the Board of Supervisors committed $20 million in Los Angeles County general funds for the housing for the homeless. This is the first time ever that such a commitment has been made! And through the Mental Health Services Act planning process (Proposition 63 of 2004), Shelter Partnership was instrumental in assuring that $10.6 million was set-aside for permanent housing for the persons with severe mental illnesses who are homeless in a first-ever Housing Trust Fund for Services and Operating Support. Additionally, the County Board of Supervisors committed $100 million for a pre-development loan fund and capital development funding as well as other essential rental assistance programs for the homeless. At the same time, the City of Los Angeles committed $100 million to develop permanent supportive housing for the homeless.
Shelter Partnership is recognized at the local, state and national levels for its expertise and insight into the characteristics and unmet needs of various sub-populations of the homeless. In 2000, I accepted the award at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. for most outstanding nonprofit organization by the National Alliance to End Homelessness. Additionally, in 2000, I was appointed by Senator pro Tempore John Burton to the Senate Bipartisan Task Force on the Homeless that issued a report with recommendations that resulted in several millions of new dollars allocated for housing for homeless individuals and families.
In 2003, the Director of the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) appointed me to the Loan Advisory Committee responsible for reviewing the State’s recommendations on the expenditures of the successful $2.1 billion housing bond issue (Proposition 46 of 2002). I continue to be a member of the committee, charged with reviewing proposals funded through 1C approved by the voters in November 2006, which includes $195 million for supportive permanent housing for individuals who are homeless or at-risk of becoming homeless and $50 million for emergency and transitional housing.
In 2006, I received the Pioneer Women Award from the Los Angeles Commission on the Status of Women and the Los Angeles City Council. And in March 2008 I was awarded Woman of the Year for the 22nd Senatorial District.
Public officials, business groups, foundations, elected officials and the media consult us regularly on the best approaches to ending homelessness. We also make presentations locally, regionally and nationally on a wide variety of issues affecting the homeless and are recognized for our factually driven, creative and well-informed opinions and insight.
In 1988, three years after we established Shelter Partnership, we began receiving requests from retailers and manufacturers who wanted to get their donations to homeless individuals and families. First there was the man with more than 1,000 raincoats. We accepted the donation and I stuffed them in the back seat and trunk of my old Volvo sedan and delivered the coats to shelters in downtown Los Angeles and Hollywood. Then there was the children’s apparel industry group that had $100,000 worth of children’s clothing. We hired a trucking firm and had the clothing delivered to five homeless family shelters throughout the county who in turn shared the bounty with other family shelters.
Through experiences such as these, we realized that there was an untapped market for a “wholesaler” to secure large-scale donations of new excess products and distribute them to agencies on the front-line of serving people who are homeless.
The Gannett Foundation provided the initial grant, $250,000 (more than our entire budget at the time), that allowed us to do something that you are seldom given the opportunity to do in our sector. With full program funding for the year, we were able to prove ourselves so that we could ask other philanthropists and supporters to help continue the project with all of the start-up issues resolved and a track record of strong accomplishments.
And then many others joined in with us to make the project a reality. Supervisor Deane Dana’s Chief of Staff, Don Knabe (now Supervisor Knabe!), held a luncheon to introduce us to businesses. Judge Harry Pregerson of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit introduced us to Louise Oliver, then Property Manager for the U.S. General Services Administration and now long-time Board Member. In less than two weeks from our first conversation with Louise, we had a permit to occupy at no cost our original 30,000 square foot warehouse space in the City of Bell. Comic Relief gave us a $20,000 grant to buy our first forklift. (We still have it!)
After a nearly four-year process, we received the title conveyance from the federal government of our 108,000 square foot warehouse in July 2007. The warehouse, built in the 1940s in record time for use during World War II, is on nearly six acres in the City of Bell and in the same complex where we have housed our project (in three previous warehouses) for the last 20 years.
We have secured $3.4 million in pledges to date for the project from foundations including the S. Mark Taper Foundation, the Weingart Foundation, the Ahmanson Foundation, the Ralph M. Parsons Foundation, the Rose Hills Foundation, the W.M. Keck Foundation, and the Marisla Foundation, as well as members of our board of directors. We have renamed the project the S. Mark Taper Foundation Shelter Resource Bank in honor of our lead donor. We have also secured a favorable line-of-credit from Century Housing in case there are gaps in receipt of funding. We commenced construction on January 14th and it was completed in June 2009.
Throughout this process, the warehouse continues to be operational and we both receive goods from our product donors and distribute goods to our participating agencies. We have now brought in more than $160 million in product donations and distributed over $150 million in product donations. Last year alone, we distributed $9.4 million in product donations to 230 agencies.
We have also made incredibly smart decisions (some would say lucky), in the hiring of our staff. Two of the original staff members have been with the project practically since its inception. Jerry Ayala, our Warehouse Manager who supervises our three incredibly hard-working, Warehouse Associates, has been with the agency since 1989. Anita Morales, who oversees all agency relations and distributions, has also been with us since we started. They are both dedicated to the agency and have done a spectacular job in assuring that we are able to distribute millions of dollars in new goods for homeless people! And Jennifer Marquez, who has been with us for three years, is our very capable Gifts In-Kind Manager, and through her ingenuity and perseverance, she has brought in 109 new product donors, bringing the total number of unduplicated product donors since our inception to almost 600!
Homelessness doesn’t have to be in our future. Shelter Partnership agrees with the National Alliance to End Homelessness that homelessness can be ended if we are strategic in our work, resources are made available, we work smartly, and we all work together.
We have accomplished a great deal, but much more needs to be done. With your support, we look forward to developing new partnerships and opportunities to address and end homelessness in our community.
