Family Promise Cape May County, NJ
About - Family Promise Cape May County
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Page Index: - Special Objectives - History - First Interfaith Hospitality Network - Program - Staffing - Board of Directors |
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Our Goals and Objectives
The principle goals of Family Promise of Cape May County are to:
Provide shelter, meals, and case management for homeless families.
Help homeless families find a home.
Refer homeless families to appropriate agencies for job training or retraining and family services.
Increase volunteerism in the community and advocacy for meeting the needs of low-income and homeless families.
Special objectives are to:
Maintain at least 13 host churches and congregations to provide shelter for homeless families within their own facilities.
Recruit and maintain 800-1,000 volunteers among the churches and community.
Provide private sleeping accommodations, and all meals (dinner, breakfast, and a bag lunch), 365 days a year for up to 12 homeless people each night.
Provide shelter, meals and support services in a cost-effective way, using volunteers, community facilities, agencies, and other local resources. Generally a Network’s cost per person per day is less than one third the average cost of traditional shelters.
Help 70% or more of homeless families in the Network obtain suitable housing.
“It's simply astounding to see what happens when compassionate volunteers work together to help their neighbors in need. Over and over again, I see how families become empowered, and communities are transformed.”
Karen Olson, Founder & President, Family PromiseIn 1982, Karen Olson was a marketing executive who developed promotional campaigns for consumer products. One morning, on her way to a meeting, she saw a homeless woman, someone she'd seen over and over again on her way to work.
She decided to buy a sandwich for the woman. The stranger accepted the sandwich but asked for something else - a moment to be heard, to be comforted, and to be considered as more than a mere statistic on a cold street corner.
Soon, Karen and her two young sons began frequent trips to New York to hand out sandwiches to the homeless. As she came to know some of the city's homeless people, she began to understand the profound loss and disconnection that homelessness causes. That understanding turned into an enduring commitment.
The First Interfaith Hospitality Network
Olson learned that there were hundreds of homeless people, including families, in her home community of Union County, New Jersey.
She turned to the religious community for help, convinced that there were many who shared her concern and that together they could do what they couldn't do alone. Within ten months, eleven area congregations came forward to provide hospitality space within their buildings. The local YMCA agreed to provide showers and a day center for families. A car dealer discounted a van.
On October 27, 1986, the first Interfaith Hospitality Network opened its doors.
Visit www.FamilyPromise.org
According to the latest Family Promise Program Services Report, there are 141 local affiliates operating across the country. 3,048 families comprised of 9,747 individuals (59% children) were served. All told, over 30,000 individuals received some form of assistance nationwide from Family Promise.
Family Promise of Cape May County
Locally, Family Promise of Cape May County, was incorporated to bring the national Family Promise expertise and twenty years of experience, together with the facilities and resources of our local congregations in order to bear on this county’s family homeless problem. FPCMC board members have since consolidated the critical mass of interfaith congregations to support hands-on emergency housing program.
(NOTE -- While congregations of all faiths are involved in the sheltering and feeding of families, there are no religious obligations to its participants. Family Promise of Cape May County, or FPCMC, seeks to affirm participants’ cultural, ethnic, and racial identity, and is respectfully open to any Cape May County family in need.)
With no family emergency in the county, homeless families remain at the mercy of whatever resources are available at the time - usually isolated placement in motels, or referred to shelters in other counties, both severely disrupting their lives. Because motels have limited cooking, laundry and storage facilities, significant expense and inconvenience is created for the families no matter where they are placed. The children of the targeted homeless families, must survive in physically unhealthy situations, witness drug use and violence, move from place to place and school to school, have few friends and experience academic failure. Without support or intervention, they, like their parents, slowly tend to become psychologically vulnerable, and live with feelings of distrust, fear, and emptiness that tend to follow them into adulthood and throughout the rest of their lives.
Family Promise of Cape May County consists of congregations from Cape May to Ocean City, which together harness the resources of 800 - 1,000 volunteers. Each participating church or synagogue serves as a host congregation for two to four homeless families for a one-week period, four times each year. The host congregation provides meals and overnight sleeping accommodations. Guest families spend the day at the Day Center, located in Rio Grande, where they care for children and look for jobs and housing. A van owned by the Network will transport guests to the Day Center each morning and back to the host congregation each evening.
Local social service agencies refer homeless families to the Network, and work cooperatively to provide day programs, including employment training, counseling, entitlement orientation, child care and health care. A Case Manager and Network Director, both work out of the day center/administrative office. The director also promotes linkages to other agencies and facilitates volunteer services.
Network Director - Laurie Johnson
Case Manager - Kathleen O’Neill
Van Driver - Leif Johnson
Trained volunteers are at the heart of the IHN program. They operate the program at their congregations and provide personal support for homeless families, who are considered guests of the Network. Volunteers set up beds, cook meals, do laundry, and perform many other tasks. Volunteers work in shifts, and stay overnight at the congregation’s facility. By sharing meals and conversation, by interacting with and listening to parents and children, the volunteers come to know the human face of homelessness and learn about its root causes. Volunteers not only work in their congregation’s facility, but also help guests find housing, jobs and job training opportunities.
*A Network Director oversees the program; trains volunteers; supervises the day center; schedules the transportation; makes sure that the children of the Network are enrolled and stay in school.
*A Family Advocate provides case management to all guest families. Conducts intake interviews with prospective families; develops family plans; meets with the guests to monitor progress in securing housing, employment, job training, and entitlements; assist guests with social service needs, referring them to other organizations as appropriate; advocates with agencies for guests as needed.
Working together, utilizing a proven
and effective model (the IHN program),
enables the community to address
the needs of homeless families
right in their own backyard.
Suzanne Smigo - President
Mary Durkin - Vice President
Jean Davis - Secretary
Ron Goldstein - Treasurer
Mark Allen
Kathy Balin
Tom Blount
Peter Compare
Suzann Callinan
Sandy E. Hamer-Jensen
David Laquintano
Jackie Speck
Patrick Walsh
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www.FamilyPromiseCMC.org
Last Page Up-Date ~~
14 November 2011