I’m Brook, ESG Outreach Supervisor at Hospitality House. I assist individuals and familiesquickly regain stability in permanent housing after experiencing a housing crisis or homelessness. I also help homeless individuals find the needed medical and financial resources to help them get back on their feet and into housing.
I want to share a story with you, a story about a client who I will call Lucy. Lucy has been living in a local motel for the past year with her two children and her 16-year-old son’s infant. Lucy has a fulltime job but due to the shortage of affordable housing options in the area, she continues to be passed by on rentals and is spending nearly all of her income on the motel to keep her family sheltered. The motel alone costs over $3,000 a month. Lucy sustained like this until we learned about her circumstances. Our Homeless Outreach and Medical Engagement (HOME) Team and I have started working with Lucy to help her identify available housing, and we are happy to announce that we have found an apartment for her. Lucy and her family are moving into an apartment next week! Hospitality House is providing the first month and security deposit to help the family have a secure and stable place to call home. Lucy will continue to receive wraparound services from Hospitality House including case management visits and calls to ensure that her family has all the resources needed to sustain permanent housing. We thank donors in the community who step forward to help Lucy and others receive that extra boost of support to overcome homelessness. To learn more about Hospitality House, please visit hhshelter.org.
Normally at this time, we thank all the cook groups who came and cooked over the last week, but to keep our shelter safe, our cooking groups are supporting our meals by donating financial support and food. Chef Gina is safely cooking all meals instead. We’d like to thank Sierra Memorial Nevada Hospital, Nevada County United Unitarian Universalist Community of the Mountains, Sierra Pines Church, The Kitchen KutUps, The Home Team, and Repeat Offenders, and BriarPatch Food Co-Op and SPD Markets for all their recent help. To everyone who donated our most needed items last week, thank you as well!
And the needs of the shelter for this week are:
- Baby car seats, baby blankets, strollers and diapers, sizes newborn, 1 and 2
- Blankets, twin size
- Bottled water
- Hairbrushes
- Headphones
- Men’s and women’s jackets, all sizes
- Men’s and women’s underwear, sizes M and L
- Men’s sweatpants, all sizes
- Men’s t-shirts, sizes M, L and XL
- Napkins
- New pillows
- Paper towels, large
- Paper plates/bowls
- Plastic utensils
- PPE masks (disposable or neck gators)
- Sweatshirts/hoodies, all sizes
- Toothbrushes
- Toothpaste
- Travel bags, duffle bags and backpacks
- Women leggings, all sizes
Please drop off urgent items or mail them to Utah’s Place, located in Brunswick Basin, past the DMV, at 1262 Sutton Way in Grass Valley. For a tax receipt, please ring the doorbell and wait for someone to come outside to assist you. We greatly appreciate the community’s help at such times of uncertainty. In the words of Utah Phillips, “If we all stick together, we’ll get what we need.” Thank you!