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I guess I am the old timer around here. I have been with Partners going on 14 years. I started out working one day a week keeping the books for Partners. We had 2.5 employees at the time. Fast forward 14 years and now we have almost 40 employees, 11 properties and 588 units and I work way more than one day a week. What a ride it has been. It has kind of been like raising my kids, which were little when I started. We have learned a lot along the way, had our ups and downs, and now we are almost ready to go off to college. We have to figure out what we want to be when we grow up. Do we keep providing a continuum of housing ranging from affordable housing to permanent supportive housing? Or do we focus solely on permanent supportive housing as the answer to homelessness?
We have been innovative in the way that we created our properties; always searching for new partners and different ways to produce safe, decent and affordable housing units. The supportive housing industry is constantly changing, or should I say the funding sources in the supportive housing industry are constantly changing and seem to be harder to come by. One thing that hasn’t changed at Partners: we all feel that it is everyone’s right to have safe, decent and affordable housing. Our challenge going forward is how to continue to provide this housing that we feel is so important to our community. We have been visiting other providers to learn different ways of accomplishing our goals, and are always interested in new ideas. I would love your feedback, ideas, comments or thoughts, so call me if you want to share.
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Indianapolis is abuzz with everything Super Bowl XLVI, and deservedly so. Downtown is amazing! Our city has been preparing itself for three years for this week, and all early impressions from the media indicate that we are succeeding!
One of the Super successes of this whole experience has been going on a couple of blocks down the street from our office. The Super Bowl Legacy Project - http://www.indianapolissuperbowl.com/legacy-project-overview/ - has re-gentrified a corridor of East 10th Street on the near-East side that suffers from abandoned homes, higher crime rates, drugs, prostitution and high unemployment. If you haven’t driven down E. 10th toward downtown for a while, you should make the drive. The transformation is nothing short of amazing!
Do these problems still exist there? Yes. In fact, just a couple of days ago, I saw a prostitute pick up a john not even 100 yards from the boundary of the beginning of the Legacy Project. But it is a giant step forward for our neighborhood. It is a battle won in the war against urban decay.
Partners In Housing has been a soldier in that war for 19 years now. Starting with The Burton Apartments in 1995, we have identified properties written off as “blight” (almost all of them on Indianapolis’ East Side) and completely renovated them into housing units for some of Indianapolis’ most vulnerable citizens.
We wish to thank the Super Bowl Host Committee for their work in bringing the Super Bowl to the Circle City, their selection of the near-East Side for the Legacy Project, and all they have done to revitalize our neighborhood!
One of my favorite books is The Soloist by Steve Lopez. It is the story of Mr. Lopez’ friendship with a gentleman, Mr. Nathaniel Ayers who after being in school at Julliard, develops schizophrenia and eventually ends up playing violin and living on the streets of Los Angles, California. The book chronicles their early friendship and the trials that Mr. Lopez sees Mr. Ayers experience.
Last year, I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Lopez at a National Alliance of Mental Illness conference in Indianapolis. During his keynote, Mr. Lopez said no less than 5 times that “supportive housing works”. This is mildly amazing when you consider that Mr. Lopez is a journalist, and prior to meeting Mr. Ayers was unfamiliar with the world that works to house those who are homeless and to provide them with the most appropriate supports available to help them maintain that housing.
Many times we drive by the chronic homeless and we don’t truly see them. I will always respect Mr. Lopez for making Mr. Ayers more than just another homeless face we don’t truly see, through this work, Mr. Ayers becomes someone for whom we care.
The residents we serve at Partners In Housing each have names and stories just like Mr. Ayers. I invite you pick up the book and after you read it, come volunteer with us and get to know our residents on a personal level.
A New Day. A Renewed Commitment. That is our staff motto for 2012 here at Partners In Housing. 2011 was, shall we say,” something else” for the staff at Partners. It saw the turnover of four of the six executive staff positions, including the founding Executive Director. It saw the turnover of much of our property management staff. It saw good people working through bad morale.
But as the year drew to a close, new leadership was in place and new expectations and attitudes were starting to take root. Several changes have already occurred internally and externally (Exhibit A – this new website), and several bigger ones are on the way in the next few months as the Board of Directors and staff work through strategic planning and rebranding. The staff feels renewed about their work once again. One Support Services staff member told me that she was the most hopeful about the organization than she had been in over two years.
2012 is a new year, but it is also a new day for Partners In Housing. Whether you’re a long-time friend and supporter or a newbie to the organization, stick with us this year and see what’s next!