summer 2007

Dear Friends:

With the weather forecast calling for temperatures in the 90s every day for a week, I find myself grateful for the day-to-day luxuries available to my family.  Luxuries like air conditioning, a refrigerator, and plenty of water for drinking and showers.  As we head into the hottest part of the summer, our daytime shelter is serving more than 200 people per day.  We have provided a watering station to help folks get the cooling water they need, and we’re doing our best to keep our clients out of the brutal sun.  As you might imagine, our need for personal hygiene products is especially great at this time of year. 

While our staff is doing everything possible to help our shelter clients through this difficult time, we know that shelter alone is not enough to solve the problem of homelessness.   Ultimately, what a homeless person needs most is a place to call home.  My staff and I are very excited to be working with several wonderful community partners to help meet this need.

Thanks to a brand-new partnership with CountyCorp, we are now able to offer a small number of homeless families and individuals affordable housing with support services in some lovely rehabbed homes.  Also, the Veterans’ Administration (VA) has provided us with a grant to provide transitional housing and support services for 10 homeless veterans, starting in September.  Perhaps most exciting of all, The Other Place has been selected to provide  support services at the River Commons apartments, a new development that’s moving 100 people from homelessness to housing.  By offering one-on-one support services from trained case managers, we can help the newly-housed to address the issues that led them to become homeless in the first place.  We know that we must set people up for success rather than failure.

How can you help us with these new programs?  As always our greatest need is for your continued financial support.   Again, I’m reminded of the luxuries most of us take for granted – dishes, bed and bath linens, and even paper products and cleaning supplies.  A start-up kit can help someone’s new place start to feel like home.  I invite you to give us a call at (937) 461-6078 and get involved.

The Other Place and our many community partners are working hard to achieve our vision of a community where there is no homelessness, and I hope you will continue to support our efforts.  After all, having a place to call home is a ‘luxury’ that should be available to each and every one of us.

Respectfully,

Tina M. Patterson

Tina M. Patterson
Executive Director

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