BFJ

The Sobrato After Shelter Program in Gilroy is a place where homeless families come to rebuild their lives. In nine months time, residents learn how to find jobs, maintain a budget, and plan for the future. Due to their hard work and the support they receive, a significant number of residents leave this program with the ability to purchase their own homes.

Eight years ago, Patricia Vasquez (the manager of the housing program) and her staff thought that a traditional Posada would bring the resident Hispanic families some comfort during the holiday season. A Latin American tradition, the Posada honors the birth of Christ by re-enacting the Joseph and Mary’s journey to find shelter in Bethlehem.

Excited residents willingly volunteered to coordinate the event, and an annual tradition was born. This year, community and staff members generously donated table, chairs, and some traditional food, and collected $1500 to pay for the traditional tamales and atole, a hot chocolate beverage. But this was the first year there were no funds to pay for the musicians.

Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County was delighted to donate $450 for authentic Mariachi musicians to come to the shelter and bring a little bit of home to these very grateful residents who are working so hard to pull their lives together.

A couple of years ago, Julia and Katie Ransohoff — two amazing teenage sisters — came to us for help in writing a teaching module on bullying in schools for fifth-grade students. Katie and Julia have remained in close touch with us on the success of this project, and we have felt like proud parents to these wonderful teens. This summer, they wrote, "We now have a considerable amount of experience regarding grant application and dedication to service. We were recently appointed to Youth Venture's National Advisory Council."

They then invited us to participate in their next exciting venture. As they tell it:

"We are the book review editors. We have made contacts with major New York publishers of young adult literature, and have literally about 200 books in our living room waiting to be reviewed. We took over the position of book review editors two years ago when the teacher who started the site in 1999 was having trouble keeping that part of the site going. Our cousin in Colorado manages the forum, where we also comment on book reviews. We send books to young adults anywhere in the world for free once they have 25 posts on the forum and have committed to email us their review within one month of receiving the book. We have readers in the Middle East, Guam, England, and around the U.S., but we lack funds to pay for postage. It usually costs around $3 a book, media rate. In January, we contacted the principal at East Palo Alto Charter School to work with her eight graders and help build their library, asking for a book review in exchange for the books we donate. Since this school is local to us, we have been able to meet with her and Ms. Chacon, the eight-grade humanities teacher. Our request for a grant to keep this going would be for supplies to teach the eighth-graders in August (for handouts, bookmarks, a small cart in the library for Teenlit books, and postage of about $15 a month to send books for the next year). This would total about $200. The publishers (Random House, Penguin, Knopf, St. Martins, etc.) have made a good connection with us and are pleased that their books are promoted, and we are even more thrilled to be able to promote literacy. The teacher who owns the site and the webmaster are in Michigan. We meet monthly by web chat to coordinate ourselves and plan for site revisions. Do you think this is something that BFJ would support? It is local, national, international, and global …"

Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County was thrilled to grant them the money they requested, and to participate in a project that encourages teens to read. We’re also excited to be supporting these sisters in building a life for themselves that’s based in philanthropy.

EHC LifeBuilders, a prominent non-profit in the San Francisco Bay Area, provides housing and services for the local homeless. One of the projects they sponsor is the Cold Weather Shelter Program. During the months of November through March of each year, EHC LifeBuilders contracts with the local armories to provide nightly shelter for people living on the streets. The housing is rudimentary at best, providing a thin sleeping mat on the floor, a blanket, a shower and a hot meal. Sometimes a beauty college will volunteer free haircuts and, on occasion, clean socks and underwear are donated. For many years, Julie Royball has been managing this project for EHC LifeBuilders.

One day, we dropped by for a visit. Rows and rows of mats lay on the floor, and people were lined up for their dinner. We asked Julia where all these people go when the armories shut down in March. She told us they live under bridges and down by the creek. "We bring them sandwiches and blankets, and bus passes so they can get to doctors' appointments. If they have a bus pass, they can ride the bus all day and stay dry if it’s raining." When asked who funds this project, she said, "Oh, we just do it. We make sandwiches in our kitchen, then go down to the creek to bring them the food and blankets. We know where they are."

The members of our chapter were so taken with Julia's matter-of-fact selflessness that Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County was delighted to give her $400 to fund food, blankets, clean socks, and bus passes for the people she cares for so tenderly.

The Day Worker Center of Mountain View serves as a gathering place, a place to find work and a hot meal at lunchtime, as well as a home away from home for anyone who is forced by extreme poverty to live away from their country, home and family. On average, only 30% obtain employment on any given day, usually for only four hours per assignment.

Maria Marroquin, the Executive Director of the Day Worker Center (who was once a day worker there herself) came to us with three projects she wanted funding for. The first project requires financial support to be able to teach classes in flower arranging, a skill that will help the workers support themselves. We gladly supported this project, knowing it would open the door for more skills courses needed for other areas of employment.

The second project requires funding for a newsletter that will be the voice of the workers. Maria's plan is for this newsletter to serve as a communications tool between the workers, and to include practical information, such as community events. It will also serve as a useful handout to help acquaint both potential employers and potential day workers with the Center's services.

The third is a pilot project to create a "novella." Says Maria, "Our workers have lives that are full of drama, misfortunes, and dangers. We plan to interview workers ... about their life experiences, goals, and dreams. Using the novella format, we can take advantage of an enormously popular feature in Latino culture to communicate important information to our workers, as well as to validate their experiences." Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County is delighted to support all three of these projects with a grant of $1,000. We're looking forward to receiving the first newsletter and reading the first novella.

Julia and Katie Ransohoff, a pair of articulate, enthusiastic 13- and 15-year-old sisters, were quick to capture the hearts of the board of directors of Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County. The girls had written a teaching program for the fifth grade about bullying in schools, including a web site, student modules, teacher curriculum and worksheets. "We are passionate about early intervention into this problem in our community. We feel that young people's perspectives will make a difference in promoting good peer relationships." They piloted the program in the fifth-grade class at the Escondido School in Palo Alto, CA. Then they expanded the modules and adapted them to meet California's state curriculum standards, and will be bringing the program into other schools in the community. They asked Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County for a $500 grant to help with the costs of this project. How could anyone say no? Bread for the Journey is thrilled to support such an inspired project and to become a part of these young women's lives.

Paula Communeli’s dream is to change the way that mental health services are perceived and delivered in her community. Although many excellent resources exist, she perceived one glaring absence — the voices of the patients and their families. Last year, through her grass-roots organization, Listening Well Alliance, she gathered five brave community members, all of whom had been affected by mental illness in some way, for a weekend program entitled "Trust - Truth - Triumph: A Celebration of the Resiliency of the Human Spirit." Through a facilitated process, the participants shared and explored their stories about their own experience with mental illness. As a result of this process, each participant wrote and delivered a 10-minute heartfelt monologue.

That weekend — which culminated in sharing their monologues with each other in the presence of an audience — was a life-changing experience for all, participants and audience alike. Encouraged by the success of the event, Paula came to us with a request for help in subsidizing a similar event for this fall. Deeply touched by the stories she shared, we were honored to be a part of her project. A $1300 grant from Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County went toward paying the fee for the retreat center.

Last Fall, Bread for the Journey of Santa Clara County had the opportunity to support Paula's dream again when we were invited to sponsor a table at the presentation of the monologues with a donation of $150. What an outrageous celebration of "Trust, Truth and Triumph" it was! To a room full of more than 250 spell-bound people, each participant in the workshop presented his or her monologue, sharing their own journey with mental illness. Each story was very different, but each carried a similar theme -- gratitude, joy, hopefulness, and the calm acceptance that mental illness would always be a factor in their lives. We were deeply honored to have been a small part of these people's journeys.