COVID-19 has caused turmoil in virtually every aspect of society and brought to the forefront the social imbalances that nonprofits have been fighting for years. As the corona-virus crisis stretches into its sixth month, Orange County nonprofits and the people they serve are in the battle of their lives, as hunger and the risk of homelessness grow to levels never seen before.
The Business Journal reached out to five notable area nonprofits that tackle homelessness, feed the hungry, and serve families in crisis to understand how their organizations have been managing in the face of such challenges, and the role the community can play to help them—and the people they serve—through these difficult times.
Participating nonprofits include:
• Orange’s Illumination Foundation, which provides targeted, interdisciplinary services for the most vulnerable homeless adults and children in order to disrupt the cycle of homelessness.Â
• Share Ourselves (SOS), a nationally recognized health center providing high quality, comprehensive safety net services to the homeless and near-homeless in Orange County. The Costa Mesa-based group is one of 256 health centers nationally to be designated as a Healthcare for the Homeless provider.
• Grandma’s House of Hope, a 24-month Transitional Housing Program in Santa Ana which provides a wide range of supportive services with the goal of self-sufficiency and compassionate and uplifting transitional care for women in crisis and hungry children in Orange County.
• Serving People in Need (SPIN), which serves homeless families with children for all cities in Central Orange County. Costa Mesa-based SPIN provides not only housing but prevention and diversion services so that families may be able to avoid becoming homeless.
• Tustin’s Orange County Rescue Mission, which provides clothing, meals, shelter, medical, counseling, and legal services for the causes of transitional and chronic homelessness.
The following is a collection of their responses to five questions.
How did you and your team respond when the COVID-19 crisis initially began?
The Illumination Foundation was selected by the Orange County Health Agency to be the local service provider for Project Roomkey, a collaborative effort by the state and county to secure hotel and motel rooms for vulnerable people experiencing homelessness, providing a way for people who don’t have a home to stay inside and prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Illumination Foundation quickly opened six temporary sites and has served more than 1,500 people since March.
For Share Ourselves, the primary focus from day one was keeping their staff working. Christy Ward, CEO, explained that she didn’t want to reduce the essential services the team provided. “We did a comprehensive plan of what we could do, with our employees working from home,” Ward said. “We determined how we could shift some of our services to a virtual platform.”
In less than one month, Grandma’s House of Hope expanded its housing program to include a COVID-19 recovery home, quadrupled food distribution and implemented stringent health guidelines for the safety of their team and participants.
When the crisis began, Serving People in Need (SPIN) was named as a designated Access Point in Orange County for homeless families. The coverage area includes Santa Ana, Fountain Valley, Huntington Beach, Newport Beach, Westminster and Tustin. Referred by police office liaisons, the 211 nonprofit and city services, SPIN is now seeing an average of 60 more families each month this year compared to last year. The increase led SPIN to bring on a full-time patient navigator, who acts as the first point of contact with the client, and uncover what they need, be it homeless prevention or diversion, rental assistance, food or job training.
On March 3, when the American public was just beginning to hear the first inklings that this mysterious new coronavirus that was decimating China and Europe might be impacting America the same way, the leadership at the Orange County Rescue Mission was discussing the sudden dearth of toilet paper and the increased price for hand sanitizer. The team thought it might be good to refill their supply of both. If the new disease didn’t make it to California, there would just be a little extra of both in their storage room. They made a needs list for their business donors as well, a little extra insurance. Both those decisions turned out to be prescient, given the run on both products that would happen shortly after.
What is the biggest challenge you faced due to the crisis?
With the influx of individuals and families in need of housing right away, the Illumination Foundation quickly had to hire enough front-line staff while still maintaining normal operations. In addition to the Roomkey clients, Illumination Foundation cares for more than 1,000 individuals and families every day.
Obtaining enough PPE was one of the first challenges SOS faced; the next was calming the anxiety of the clients they served.
“For folks to come and receive our services, we had to make physical adjustments to mitigate for health, safety and accessibility,” said Imelda Buncab, community engagement manager, SOS. “During normal operations, our clients come into the lobby and we have a longer interaction. But now, because we are trying to ensure theirs—and our—health and safety, we process them quickly through the line. People are missing the social connection.”
Because of COVID-19, Grandma’s House of Hope had to cancel its annual gala and lost more than $150,000 in 2020 budgeted program funding.
“We also lost 75% of our volunteer and student intern support because of the stay-at-home order,” said Je’net Kreitner, CEO and founder, Grandma’s House of Hope. “As a nonprofit that relies heavily on volunteers and interns, this posed additional challenges for food preparation, packing and weekly distribution to our six Nana’s Kidz locations.”
For SPIN, the biggest challenge was ensuring there was enough funding to continue their programs uninterrupted. One of the organization’s largest moneymakers, the annual dinner, will now be held virtually on Sept. 25. It’s uncertain if it will make the same amount as in previous years. Fortunately, two sponsors have stepped up at the $25,000 level already, so Jean Wegener, SPIN’s executive director is optimistic. Also, she says, private donors are stepping up to help out. The Argyros Family Foundation, for example, recently made a $25,000 donation.
Like other nonprofits, Orange County Rescue Mission requires supplies. They’re actively engaging with business to hold events like diaper drives and food drives. Unlike most other nonprofits, they don’t take any government funding. While that allows them to be nimble and highly efficient, it also means that they continually communicate their needs with the local community.
Fortunately, says Jim Palmer, president, Orange County Rescue Mission, business and individuals have been more than willing to help in whatever way necessary. When the group put out a call for volunteers, many showed up to sort donated items, box them up for distribution and work in the kitchen, helping provide 1,000 meals a day. Palmer says they currently need volunteers who have education backgrounds to help with their distance learning program.
Have you experienced an increase in demand for your services during the pandemic? If so, by how much compared to last year?
Job loss and the closure of businesses are just some of the collateral damage of this global pandemic. COVID-19 has created a struggling economy, leading to a more that 50% increase in the demand for Illumination Foundation’s housing services.
SOS has seen a huge influx of calls for services, Ward says. “We went from 700 calls to 1,400 in a day. It’s been a very big challenge. At the beginning, we saw more than a 30% increase in demand for our food pantry. There were days when we gave out 1,000 bags of food.”
In March, SOS distributed a total of 4,749 food bags, a significant increase from February of 1,454. They average about 258 bags per day since the pandemic started, distributing food Monday to Friday.
Fortunately, SOS was able to quickly adapt to the increase in demand, thanks to local restaurants that donated the perishable food they could not use once the shutdown went into effect. In addition, the community quickly responded for calls for donations. Now, Ward says, the demand has evened out as more food distribution centers have been established by other organizations.
The pandemic forced Grandma’s House of Hope to hyper-focus its team efforts on the rising critical and urgent needs of the community. “We had to create partnerships that would improve our ability to distribute enormous amounts of healthy food weekly,” Kreitner says. “In doing so, we quadrupled our food distribution in less than one month, and have sustained this growth for over five months, with no end in sight.”
SPIN, which provides housing programs and services for up to one year, saw the demand double since March. “That’s the life of a nonprofit,” Wegener says. “Things change all the time. You have to rise to the occasion.”
Certain services at the Orange County Rescue Mission have seen a huge demand, Palmer says.
Since the beginning of March, the organization has served 47,249 meals. A total of 15,683 have spent the night at its Village of Hope. The people they serve—who are called “students”—have gone through 4,550 hours of crisis counseling to help deal with the stress and anxiety of the coronavirus crisis.
Overall, Palmer says, since March 3, more than 114,000 students have taken advantage of the resources the group offers.
What new programs or services has your organization created?
The Illumination Foundation implemented a virtual literacy program for the children in its family emergency shelters. The program is supported by two volunteer developmental and behavioral pediatricians from CHOC who work closely with the children in the foundation’s Children and Families program.
The virtual meeting platform Zoom, Ward says, has become an essential piece of the way SOS cares for the people it serves. “We’re now doing about 50% of care through telephonic visits and virtually,” she adds. SOS has partnered with the Orange County Health Agency and is now providing drive-thru testing for those with COVID-19 symptoms or exposure.
Grandma’s House of Hope’s after-school education program for at-risk youth and adults has been modified to one-on-one social distance learning and the organization has implemented a door-to-door delivery service for 45 at-risk families.
SPIN is a member of the Families Solutions Collaborative, a group of 21 agencies that exclusively serve families with children. In addition, SPIN is working with the Orange County Health Agency to deliver food and other necessities to homeless individuals temporarily living in hotels due to exposure to COVID-19.
Early on in the coronavirus crisis, the Orange County Rescue Mission established a distance learning program in the event that local schools would close. It was another prescient decision, given that for the rest of the school year, and even into this one, the majority of schools have gone virtual.
Tangram Interiors, an interior design company, donated $50,000 in school furniture so kids could be homeschooled at the facility.
Cox Communications helped with broadband to ensure the children—61 in all, kindergarten through ninth grade—would be able to easily access their lessons.
The OC Rescue Mission also has virus testing available through their partnership with the Hurtt Family Clinics, which has an on-site presence at its Village of Hope. It shares the data it collects with a range of public health agencies, which in turn uses the information to understand more about the disease and the trends associated with it.
What would you like Business Journal readers to know?
“Our incredible staff has made the impossible possible,” says Paul Leon, Illumination Foundation’s CEO. “We opened up six sites in eight weeks when COVID-19 hit, all while running our normal operation. We have an unparalleled team of dedicated professionals who always put the needs of the homeless first.”
“As a community health center that serves people from all over the entire community through our six sites,” says SOS’s Buncab. The nonprofit is “an essential service meeting the needs and caring for folks who are vulnerable in their daily lives—even more so with the pandemic.”
“We appreciate the tireless work of our dedicated staff and the generous gifts of time, talent and treasure and prayers that have come our way through donors, volunteers, faith communities and corporations during this unprecedented time,” says Grandma’s House of Hope’s Kreitner. “We can’t do this work alone and need the support of each and every one of you! You are impacting the lives of so many who have lost their jobs, homes, and in many cases, their hope.”
“We just don’t have affordable housing in Orange County,” says SPIN’s Wegener. “We have a huge and ever-growing homeless population. We need to do everything we can to keep people in housing, so the homeless population doesn’t expand. The challenge of meeting this need is extraordinary. Everyone needs to be on the boat, rowing an oar.”
“We’ve been trying to identify how long this will go on,” says OC Rescue Mission’s Palmer. “We are consistently looking at this. We go by what the CDC says—don’t be closer than 6 feet for 15 minutes, wear a mask. Epidemiologists say that if you wear a mask, it should be really hard to get (COVID-19).”
