Hospitality House is the only emergency homeless shelter in Nevada County, with 69 beds for homeless men, women and children.
I’m Nicole Lescher and I’m a Case Manager at Hospitality House, setting goals with clients to help them transition from homelessness to housing. Every week we share a story, so folks in the community can get a view into what we do at the shelter.
I have a guest that I would like to tell you about today, which is a man I will call Danny. He became homeless four months ago. Danny went through a very difficult divorce and coped with the stress of the separation by drinking in attempt to manage his struggles. On top of a long history with depression, he soon found himself out of savings, without his home and facing homelessness for the first time in his life at 34-years old. Last week he came to me very stressed out; it turns out his car had broken down on Sutton Way and was cited to be towed in 72 hours. I contacted my longtime mechanic, Kevin at Arches Automotive, to see if he would be willing to help fix Danny’s car. Soon Kevin at Arches connected with Dave at Motor Electric to see if they both could work together to help Danny. I also called Gold Country Towing to see if they could help tow his car to Arches Automotive. Within an hour, all parties came together and volunteered their time to support Danny to get his car repaired – they did everything for FREE! A big thank you to all three companies! This situation is a testament to our community and how, in Utah Phillip’s words, “If we all stick together, we’ll get what we need.”
Speaking of giving! We would like to thank our members of our Hearts & Hands Club, a group of wonderful people who donate every month to support the efforts of Hospitality House. Hearts & Hands Club donations are allocated toward the greatest needs, including but not limited to shelter, food, clothing, outreach, housing assistance, case management, and job training. Thank you, club members! To join the club, visit hhshelter.org.
This past week, we were blessed by many caring individuals and I’d like to give a big thank you to Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital, Nevada City United Methodist Church, Saint Patrick’s Church, Sierra Presbyterian Church, Jazzercise, The Home Team and Repeat Offenders for coming out to cook. To everyone who donated our most needed items last week, thank you as well!
Now down to the nitty gritty needs of the shelter for this week…
- Men’s t-shirts, sizes large and extra large
- Men’s jeans, sizes 34, 36 and 38
- Men’s boxer shorts, sizes medium and large
- Shave cream
- Razors
- Flip flops
- Blankets
- Poison Oak Medicine
- Sneakers, sizes 9 – 13
- Cotton socks
Please drop off urgent items to Utah’s Place, located in Brunswick Basin, past the DMV, at 1262 Sutton Way. For all other donations that may benefit a homeless guest or the shelter in general, please take them to the backdoor of Bread & Roses, our thrift shop, located at 840 E Main Street, directly next door to Sierra Cinemas. Guests at our shelter are given shopping vouchers for the store to buy what they need, so your donation directly helps them. All other items are sold with 100% of the sales supporting the shelter’s operations. Thank you for sticking together so that we all get what we need.