A fully outfitted 53-foot trailer was loaded with school clothes, back packs, and supplies to hand out to over 200 school-aged kids!

The UCLA School of Nursing and Jules Stein Mobile Eye Van also provided children with their required immunizations, physicals and eye exams.

Union Rescue Mission CEO, Andy Bales said “We are so thankful to the Assistance League of Southern California for equipping our precious children for school. Our hope for their future as educated, productive world-changers is greatly enhanced by this wonderful opportunity”.

A few weeks ago, we were honored to have Andre Ethier join us for lunch. Along with some great people from Farmer Johns, he served up Farmer Johns hotdogs and signed autographs, handed out Dodger blankets, and took pictures with guests. Everyone had a great time!

In this short video Andre explains why he feels so passionately about URM – check it out!

This month has been busy here at URM – we’ve been blessed with amazing sponsors, great food, and celebrity guests helping to make the end of summer a good one. August has also brought us high temps, and we have been busy hitting the streets to deliver cold water to our neighbors on Skid Row.

Please take a moment to watch the August update, and hear all about our fun-filled month!

Recently, Project Night Night donated over 50 “Night Night Packages” to our kids here at URM. The organization, whose mission is to provide packages, free of charge ,to children experiencing homelessness from birth to preteen who need their essentials to feel secure, cozy, ready to learn, and significant, donates to hundreds of shelters across the United States. On average, they deliver Night Night Packages to about 25,000 children each year!

Each Night Night Package contains a new security blanket, an age-appropriate children’s book, and a stuffed animal — all nestled inside of a new canvas tote bag.  

We are so thankful to Project Night Night for providing such a sweet gift to the children at URM!

To learn more, text WATERWALK to 27138 to subscribe to text message updates. You can also contact our volunteer department at 213-347-6300, ext. 1143 for more information if you would like to join us on a water walk. And be sure to check out our latest edition of The Mission  featuring Carlos – a man who was touched by the water walk and his since graduated from the URM Men’s Life Transformation Program!

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 3^rd 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 2^nd month, and $8.00 the 3^rd 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 4^th and 5^th 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

Sixteen years of heroin and Skid Row summers took Carlos’ life away. A simple act of kindness gave it back — thanks to people like you.

Growing up in Santa Ana, my stepfather abused me, so I left home at the age of 12 and ended up on the streets. I was hurt, angry, frustrated, and filled with hate. But at the age of 17, I discovered heroin. It took all my pain away. Before long, however, it also took all my life.
In 1992, I ended up on Skid Row, living like an animal on the sidewalks. Every day was the same: I’d wake up and get my fix of heroin. Then I’d hustle all day to get another fix every three or four hours, until 10 o’clock at night when I’d collapse on the hard, unforgiving sidewalk, exhausted again.

But the long, hot summers on Skid Row were especially hard. Despite the brutal heat, restaurants and stores won’t give you water, there aren’t any drinking fountains, and all the water taps are locked. Somehow I survived 16 summers on Skid Row.

But by August 2008, I was not only thirsty, I was tired of my whole life. I knew I had to change or I’d die.That’s when some people came by and handed me a bottle of cold water. I asked them what organization they were with. They said Union Rescue Mission. The very next day I came here and completely surrendered my life to God.

Thanks to Union Rescue Mission, today I’m in college studying psychology so I can one day be a substance abuse counselor. I want to help other people like me get back on the right path.

Today I thank God, because a bottle of cold water and a simple act of kindness changed my life forever.

** In loving memory of Carlos Godoy, 2/26/1965 to 8/19/2010. **

Surviving on Skid Row is hard enough any time of year. But during the summer, when temperatures rise to 90 or 100, life is particularly brutal.

Often people who are addicted and living on these streets — like Carlos — are more focused on looking for their next fix than asking somebody for a drink of water.

Right now, there are people literally dying on the streets. That’s why, every summer, the Union Rescue Mission goes into life-saving mode to make sure people don’t die of dehydration or overheating. Any time it’s over 85 degrees, we go out at 3 o’clock and hand out 1,500 bottles of ice-cold water to folks on the street.

This is one of the ways we reach out to people on Skid Row and remind them that we’re here and available to them — and remind them that God loves them right where they’re at. When we do, many of these precious souls are convinced that we care, and they come in to the mission to give life another try.

We hope through these efforts that not one human being will be left on the streets of Skid Row. That’s our goal.

Blessings,

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!

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!