Momentum - Business to Business Online Magazine October 2018 | Page 29
Non-Profit of the Month
By: Connie Nyquist
Family Promise of Clear Creek
[email protected]
Family Promise of Clear Creek is a coalition of 19 churches in
the greater Bay Area who are working together to help
homeless families regain their housing, their independence,
and their dignity. In the United States today, one child out of
six lives in poverty. Families with children make up 35% of the
people who experience homelessness. Believing that every
child deserves a home, the churches in the greater Bay Area
have joined together to address this problem.
Many programs for the homeless separate husbands and
wives and older boys from their mothers. We are the only
program for the homeless in this area which keeps families
together.
The coalition works together to provide a safe place to sleep
in our churches on a weekly rotation. At the church the
families also receive home cooked meals and warm
hospitality that respects their dignity. The parents also
receive coaching in life skills: financial literacy, parenting
skills, job search skills and nutrition. This happens one night a
week at the churches using trained leadership and on
Saturday at the Day Center. Volunteers can be used in this
program.
We are not a shelter but rather a program that seeks to help
families achieve independence. These families do not
represent the chronically homeless but rather the invisible
homeless in our midst. They are families in our midst who
have been living pay check to pay check and then there is a
medical emergency, a divorce, a loss of job and now they
have no place to go.
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In Clear Creek School District alone there are over 3000
children classified as homeless, i.e. they do not have a
permanent address. We also serve Dickinson, Alvin, Pearland,
Friendswood and parts of Pasadena School districts. Our
guests are most often referred to us by other nonprofit
agencies in our area, the school districts and churches.
There is a Day Center in League City where the families can
go to receive case management, access to computers for job
searches and a comfortable place to spend time during the
day if they are unemployed. The Day Center also provides an
address and contact number for the families as they seek
employment.
Guests in the program often are without vehicles which
makes it impossible to secure employment, so we have
developed a Ride to Success Program, using donated
vehicles that are then loaned to our guests. When they are
ready to leave the program, they have the option of
purchasing the vehicle for a reduced cost thus putting more
money back into the program to pay for insurance, gas and
car repair for those still in the program.
Family Promise does not receive government funding, so we
are dependent on individual and business donations, support
from churches, grants and fundraising. On October 20th, we
will be holding our annual Gala at Hometown Heroes Park in
League City.
More information can be found at ccfamilypromise.org.