Accomplishments
2004 Accomplishments
LACEH&H had 5 strategic goals for 2004:
- To organize and advocate to end homelessness in the next decade in LA County
- To organize and advocate for justice in local, state, and national “safety net” policies
- To educate the community to increase access and remove barriers to “safety net” programs for homeless and low-income people
- To organize to protect the civil rights of homeless people
- To strengthen the coalition’s capacity to achieve its mission
Goal 1: To organize and advocate to end homelessness in the next decade in Los Angeles County
Objective 1: To continue the partnership with LAHSA in creating and implementing Bring LA Home! plan
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Partnership conducted 24 community meetings and 18 focus groups that involved more than 1,000 people which produced over 300 recommendations for the draft plan. LACEH&H specifically responsible for mental health, health, substance abuse, law enforcement and youth focus groups. In addition, four focus groups specifically with about 50 homeless people to review proposed recommendations
- LACEH&H helped form the "Resource Development Group" [RDG] which produced over 70 recommendations on potential dedicated sources of revenue for "Bring LA Home Trust Fund"
- Served as Vice Chair of the LAHSA Advisory Board
- LACEH&H serves on the Bring LA Home Planning Committee, along with LAHSA, Mayors Office and Supervisors Burke and Yaroslavsky offices, as well as the Executive Committee. Also serve on the Executive Committee as well as the Bring LA Home Blue Ribbon Committee.
Objective 2: Advocate for LACEHH's positions
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Convened 2 coalition meetings with all stakeholders to review recommendations and arrive at consensus on priority recommendations
- Partnered with the University of Southern California’s Center for the Study of Religion & Civic Culture to form the Interfaith Council to End Homelessness. Initial focus is bring interfaith stakeholders in South Los Angeles together to advocate for more resources to their community
- Actively participate with the ACLU the Jail Advocacy Taskforce. Staff chair the Mental Health Subcommittee working with LA Sheriff’s Department on discharge planning
- Member of Proposition 63 implementation working group on long-term homelessness and permanent supportive housing.
- All recommendations of LACEH&H in the draft Bring LA Home framework
Goal 2: Organize and advocate for justice in local, state and national safety net program.
Objective 1: Build a strong advocacy network to protect the CalWORKs Program.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Key role in California Partnership that passed SB 1639 [Education Works]- signed by the Governor.
- Helped coordinated 58 legislative visits involving more than 800 low-income people, educating state legislators on welfare issues
- Produced 14 Stories of the Week- homeless and low-income families on welfare telling their stories to elected officials
Objective 2: Increase Access to CalWORKs programs
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Conducted 3rd survey of Homeless Assistance Hotlines to determine if program administration had improved. Results: No improvement in service delivery
- LA County produced Homeless Assistance video and
- Agreed to internal quality assurance monitoring based on LACEH&H’s three surveys
Objective 3: Develop leaders among CalWORKS participants who can speak for themselves about issues affecting them.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Four women who Story of the Week became spokespeople and attended legislative visits, meetings and rallies.
Objective 4: Build a strong Save Section 8 Coalition in response to local and national crisis in Section 8
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Built Save Section 8 Coalition to have over 100 organizational members
- Conducted a briefing for 9 local congressional offices in April 2004
- The Save Section 8 Coalition participated in the July 19 national Save section 8 call in day as well as 9/8/04 National Day of Action. The two days were immediately proceeding hearings in the VA-HUD subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee on July 20 and the full Appropriations Committee on July 22. The result of these hearings was that nearly all of our demands with regards to Section 8 were met.
- The Save Section 8 Coalition organized the downtown demonstration and supported the Long Beach demonstration. Over 350 people attended the Los Angeles demonstration and about 150 were at the Long Beach demonstration. Both resulted in local media coverage.
- The Save Section 8 Coalition sent a letter to Mayor Hahn on 11/1/04 outlining unfair practices at the Housing Authority of the City of Los Angeles including their “aggressive attrition” program which has led to the dropping of people from Section 8. Followed up by dozens of phone calls leading to a meeting and a promise of resolution of the problem
- Conducted 8 presentations to community groups
- Awarded the 2004 “CRA Panther Award” by the California Reinvestment Coalition
Objective 5: Organize and advocate for justice for people who utilize the federal and state Food Stamp programs.
Objective 5[A]: Food Stamp Outreach: Conduct 5 trainings to shelters and CBOs and conduct 3 enrollment workshops
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Conducted 8 trainings to 179 low-income people on Food Stamps
Objective 5[B]: Restaurant Food Stamps: Recruit one reasonably healthful food chain to accept food stamps
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Restaurant chain, El Polo Loco, agreed to accept Food Stamps
- Monitored implementation of waiver at local and state levels
Objective 6: Food Line Defense: Defend against attempts to ban feeding in L.A. or to enforce the existing ban in Santa Monica
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Defeated efforts in downtown Los Angeles to ban feeding programs
Objective 7: CHAC: Play major L.A. role in statewide coalition for anti-hunger legislation by recruiting 20 new organizations for CHAC and bringing 75 people from LA to Sacramento for Hunger Action Day
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Enacted AB 1796, legislation to repeal ban on drug felons for food stamps
- Organized 5 buses from Los Angeles for Hunger Action Day in May 2004
Objective 8: Build the Hollywood Community Action Network [H-CAN] as an organization driven by its low income and/or homeless constituents to end homelessness in Hollywood.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- H-CAN has become an integral part of the coordinated campaign with Hollywood Interfaith Sponsoring Committee to bring a Drop-In Center and permanent housing facility to Hollywood area
- Continued to participate in “Safer Cities” Initiative with LA-CAN
- Participated in action against Border’s Bookstore for selling “Bum Fights”
- Assisting LA-CAN in planning its food needs assessment for Central City East
Objective 9: Maintain the strong ties between anti-hunger advocates and advocates working on other food system issues, including supermarket access, farmer’s markets, gardens, anti-irradiation and G.E., and healthy school food, through the Food Justice Network
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- 52 weekly updates
- 4 Point Fresh Food Access established by Mayor of Los Angeles: 3 of the 4 points passed by LA City Council. The Fresh Food Access Taskforce was established for City Hall with intent on making it a “Mayoral” Taskforce.
Objective 10: Register, educate and mobilize homeless and low income people to vote
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Registered 2,445 homeless and very low-income people to vote- involved 21 service providers and 4 local college/university Schools of Social Work
- Conducted 14 workshops
- Initiated discussion with League of Women Voters, ACLU, LA Sheriffis Dept and LA County Registrar’s office in the “Unlock the Vote” Project- to provide voter education to LA County Jail inmates on the 2005 LA City mayoral election.
- Over 2,000 Get-Out-the-Vote [GOTV] phone calls
- Visited 133 homes for GOTV and checked turnout in 66 precincts
Goal 3: Educate the community to increase access and remove barriers to “safety net” programs for homeless and low-income people.
Objective 1: Increase community awareness and access to safety net programs.
Objective 1[A]: Providers & Safety Network Programs: Increase knowledge among service providers about safety net programs.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Conducted 11 trainings on welfare issues to 183 homeless and low-income women on welfare
Objective 1[B]: Elected Officials: Educate elected officials and the public about the need for safety net programs.
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Conducted 10 briefings for local elected officials on safety net issues
Objective 1[C]: SSI Project
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- LACEH&H SSI program recognized by the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty as a national, innovative model
- Documented outreach to 1,600 residents [proposed 1,000]
- 6 issue presentation to local community organizations, food providers and Business Improvement Districts
- Facilitated 3 resident focus groups
- Conducted 8 legislative visits and 1 briefing
- Coordinated 12 public testimonies by consumers
Objective 1[D]: Hollywood Food Needs Assessment
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Market Basket Program a pilot established in collaboration with SEE LA to improve usage of WIC Farmer’s Market coupons in Echo Park. 75 WIC participants in Echo Park used their coupons, which would have otherwise gone unspent and expired in 11/04.
- Began planning for implement “higher nutritional quality food at food pantries. By the end of 2004 had schedule a workshop for early 2005 for over 100 charitable food providers on this issues, in collaboration with LA County AIDS Program and Policy Dept.
Objective 2: Write, edit, translate and print People’s Guide - Market and distribute
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Distributed over 400,000 copies of the People’s Guide- 200,000 to the LA County Department of Public Social Services and 200,000 from our offices
- Began organizing for 2005-06 People’s Guide, together with Nancy, including recruiting experts to review and revise chapter; reviewing changes necessary for book and organizing and planning editorial meetings.
Goal 4: Organize to protect the civil rights of homeless people.
Objective 1: CRA Lawsuit and Share the Wealth [STW] Coalition
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Wiggens v. CRA- This reverse validation lawsuit, brought by Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles on behalf of individual residential hotel tenants and the Los Angeles Coalition to End Hunger and Homelessness, challenged the validity of a new downtown redevelopment project that the Coalition believed would negatively impact the low-income communities of color that lived downtown. The superior court invalidated the redevelopment plan and the CRA appealed. We are awaiting the decision of the Court of Appeals.
- The STW Coalition worked with the Los Angeles City Attorney’s office in strengthening the state civil code that outlaws the 28 day shuffle. have stopped the 28-day shuffle in over 75% of residential hotels downtown, through legal intervention and tenant organizing. Through the above policy victories achieved in the past year, we hope to end the practice in the remaining 25% of properties.
- The STW Coalition is working on amending the local rent control ordinance to specifically outlaw the 28 day shuffle and add higher local penalties.
- STW Coalition successfully lobbied the Los Angeles City Council to bring the residential hotels under the jurisdiction of the Los Angeles Housing Department for health and safety complaints. This change means the hotels are now part of the City’s automatic code inspection program, and allows them to be placed in a program for severely uninhabitable residential buildings.
- Hosted 2 community meetings- Q & A with LAPD Chief Bratton – over 300 in attendance and excellent media coverage
- As part of the National Coalition for the Homeless effort in multiple cities- LACEH&H organized a rally and press conference at Borders Books to insist they stop selling “Bum Fights” video [anti-homeless video]- Outcome: Successful
- Supported SB1234 [State Senate]- Omnibus Civil Rights legislation that contained a section that expanded law enforcement training on homeless issues- Outcome: Passed
- The STW Coalition is working with several City Council offices to draft a new ordinance that would protect residential hotel units from conversion or demolition (creating a “no net loss” policy for approximately 16,000 residential hotels City-wide and preserving over 5,000 units in our downtown community).
- LACEH&H is partners with Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority to co-chair strategic planning process to create a plan to end homelessness in LA County in less than 10 years- Bring LA Home! Partnership to End Homelessness. LACEH&H has infused the civil rights protections as well as STW platform on redevelopment, affordable housing and employment into the draft plan [www.bringlahome.org]
Objective 2: Anti- Homeless Ordinances
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Organized and testified to LA City Council against proposed change in municipal code for LA Public Libraries that targeted homeless people – eliminating their ability to use library grounds to sleep. Outcome: Ordinance was not changed, which is a temporary victory
- Hollywood Community Action Network [HCAN]- a project of LACEH&H- partnering with LACAN creating the “Safer People’s Initiative” to counter LAPD Chief Bratton’s “Safer Cities Initiative”- to date- 30-40 organizational sign-on
Goal 5: Strengthen the coalition’s capacity to achieve its mission.
Objective 1: Development Strategy
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Raised over $500,000 in 2004
- Expanded the Development Advisory Board to include greater corporate participation
- Recruited 3 celebrities to be periodic spokepersons for LACEH&H [case-by-case basis]
- 2004 gala highly successful
- Expanded grantmaking with development assistant as well as 3 full time staff working on grants
Objective 2: Board of Directors
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Expanded Board of Directors for greater geographic representation as well as issue representation
Objective 3: Administration
ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
- Created and maintain a database of all People’s Guides orders, including a breakdown of each language sent and orders of 100 or more- useful for pre-sale advertisement
- Performed mailing of 2005 Gala invitations in-house, saving the organization thousands of dollars.
- Reorganized database- moved from Razor’s Edge to Access [for ease and as a cost cutting move] and eliminated duplications as well as updated database with address changes