roxo media house
[Music]
welcome back to fortitude folks JW Wilson here today’s topic of discussion
is something very serious to many people and if it’s not serious to you it should be homelessness in Tarrant County
homelessness affects about 2500 people in Tarrant County currently the man we’re about to interview Mr Toby Owen
CEO of Presbyterian night shelter is going to discuss the problem in depth and what he’s doing to help fix this
problem Toby thank you very much for the time we appreciate you yeah sure glad to do it so let’s talk about homelessness
Toby this is a very serious topic and you deal with it on a daily basis first off Presbyterian night shelter you’ve
been here since 2009 what brought you to Presbyterian night shelter well my full
career has been in the non-profit world I started in social work in 1995. I’ve
been at two organizations previous organization it was child care foster
care related ACH Child and Family Services I was there for 14 years and then came to the shelter in 2009 while I
was at ACH we did a few programs that related to homeless Youth and then we
ventured into some homeless related Services for Families and just through
the course of that and my career goals I had at the time of wanting to be a
director of a non-profit and just felt in from a faith perspective that’s very
important to me and I felt like this was a good transition a good move for me as a person so I’ve been here since 2009.
the Presbyterian knife shelter was founded in 1984 by several of the posterior churches in the Metroplex
could you give us a little bit of a background on the night shelter sure in the winter of 1983 around January
February of 1983. it was the coldest winter on record at the time 2021
surpassed that but in 1983 it was the coldest winter on record and all of the
shelters were full at that time there was an overflow shelter established during that period for by the city it
was also full and there were still people that were having to either at
not by choice but they were having to sleep in their cars or outside there was a man that froze to death in his his
vehicle or and it was at that point where three local Presbyterian churches
came together they really felt strongly that they wanted to establish a shelter that would be available to anyone in
need regardless of their circumstance so that happened in 1983
all that all of I guess it was probably November December of 83. fast forward
date December 1984 December 10 1984 is when First Presbyterian Saint Stephen’s
Presbyterian and Ridgely Presbyterian came together to create the Presbyterian night shelter originally it was only
going to be open for about three to four months during the coldest part of December of 84 into the this the winter
of 85 January February at the end of that three to four months there were
about 200 people that were staying the night at the original location which was at the corner of Rosedale and I-35 their
Fort Worth ISD school there it’s still there it’s admin or administration building and um they did not but they
did not feel like they could close when they had 200 people staying each night and so they’ve continued since then
December the 10th now one thing that has always been a part of the shelter and in my opinion it’s the absolute best
thing about the shelter without a doubt and that is we serve anyone we do not
have a criteria on who can come to the shelter you just have to be homeless so if you show up with the criminal history
you show up straight from the penitentiary you have severe mental illness you have no ID it doesn’t matter
you’re you’re welcome into the shelter we have no requirements other than you’re homeless and we invite you in to
to take part of our services Presbyterian is one of the largest if not the largest homeless shelter in
Tarrant County correct we are definitely we’re the largest in north Texas and one of the top largest in the entire State
not necessarily a good thing but it’s just the reality of being so large in my intro I mentioned 2500 ish homeless
people in Tarrant County I assume that number fluctuates a lot because a lot of people maybe aren’t known a their
whereabouts are known possibly but I uh 1500 of those you mentioned are in shelters and a thousand of those are not
in shelters and the people that living on the streets and in tents and things like that nature um Presbyterian you mentioned anybody’s
available if you have different programs for all these folks where I assume that people with families people that are
women only men only they’re not intermixed together how do you guys separate the the different segments of
people yeah so we do three primary things at the organization number one is
shelter it’s our goal to provide shelter care to where people have a safe place to go off the streets within our shelter
care model we have the family center where only families any makeup of a family stays there we have a veterans
program where 30 men are in that Pro veterans program we have a women’s
shelter the Loudoun shoots Women’s Center and then we have the Carl Travis men Center which is our men’s shelter so
we have four different shelter locations on our campus
for the shelter Care Now within shelter um the emergency shelter is just that
it’s an emergency it is not a long-term solution so getting people off the street into the shelter is just the
first step we really really want to push and motivate and help people move into housing that is really that’s the
solution for homelessness it’s a place to stay it’s housing and so we really work once someone comes into our
facility where we want to help them move out of out of shelter one shelter I forgot to mention is the building that
we’re in here and it’s called true workplace this is our day shelter it’s open seven days a week from 7 A.M to 3
P.M so we provide shelter secondly we really push people to get into housing
and through our efforts last year we had we helped 1602 people exit homelessness
into their own own home and then finally the last thing we do is employment we
really really push people to get employment if you’re homeless you need
income you need money to get out of homelessness to get into a home and typically you’re going to qualify for
some type of governmental assistance to help you get into housing or you have to work and have an income to get into
housing and so in 2016 we established a social Enterprise called up spire and
the goal of upspire is for us to provide jobs for individuals that are currently or formerly homeless help them it’s
full-time work full benefits help them have a job to create an income stream to exit homelessness and then any net
profit comes back to support the organization so overall we do shelter
housing and employment are the three buckets or three strategies we have to address homelessness I’m Craig breed
I’ve learned about this place oh I’d say about 2008. and I didn’t know where else to go
I’m born I’m a native resident in Fort Worth but I didn’t have anywhere else to go and this place stopped me from
sleeping running the bridge and after that I learned that they care about you here I don’t care what Walk of Life you
come from it’s a it’s a Christian experience either way so God brought me here and he’s brought
me here again I don’t care how many times I fall down they help me get back up I can’t beat that uh my name is Kevin
I just moved from Florida I’ve been sleep by the homeless shelter since I got an argue with my brother
overnight they’ve been very helpful riding a sleeping outside on the street and um
it’s uh if I have college to find work W-2s and pay stuff they can help me get
a house in so they’ve been very good for the homeless out here pns is a great a great stepping stone for people you know
like the program was I can keep going on and on man it’s it’s
been helpful to you to be here yeah yeah yeah it is it is so helpful so you’re
well treat me great and so supportive like so supportive so supportive like I
said I wouldn’t I wouldn’t change my job working here for all the money in the world like I
said the only job that ever made me feel like I was giving back in and it gave me a purpose so pns is great
I like the refund I like I like the uh professionalism and I I’m I like it
because I can relate not only to the staff but I can also relate to the men
and women because I think we all have a story to tell and we all can relate to
each other rather uh some of us has been and changed you know detained and rather
some of us was born free or not we still have a relative story so the shelter has
listen I don’t have nothing bad to say about it I don’t have nothing bad to say about it you know I just try to stay positive and
I take the good with the bad and I embrace it all and hey here I am thank God for the shelter thank God for the
staffs that’s in the shelter I’ve been here since the June 22nd last year everything’s good I’m about to get my
housing and it’s a great place to be If someone becomes homeless first of us talk about
that how does someone become homeless typically we have a capacity for 725 people
every night to stay the night we see about a thousand people a day between our shelter and our days our overnight
shelters and our day shelter there’s a thousand different reasons why someone comes homeless and I say that
kind of jokingly but it truly is the it there is a thousand reasons why some of the key
things that you will find one is affordable housing there is an absolute crisis across this country in affordable
housing the availability of Housing and then the affordable aspect is really a
significant issue across this entire country so being squeezed out of your current living situation whether you
lost a job or you were it happens the majority of the women the families that
come to us is because of domestic violence so if your partner beats you up
you have no place to go you end up in a shelter or if you lose your job there’s
no place to go but a shelter mental health is also a big factor in that people exiting or the criminal justice
system that is also an issue but it also goes down to things such as someone
where they were married and they their spouse dies I can’t tell you the number of times where a spouse has passed away
and they ended up in a deep depression and in ended up homeless so it really is a variety of reasons that someone
becomes homeless and there’s I’ve heard a ton of reasons why that happens but
you can start putting them in a few buckets affordable housing loss of income those sort of things I’ve been
here right out of here I’m right at my year anniversary now um from Atlanta Georgia I lost my wife
to covet after that I kind of fell on a hard time showed up here didn’t know
nobody in Fort Worth Texas I just kept hearing about the nice things the nice uh chance chances chance that I can get
back if I came here I came I had met Mr Alex
donated 22 days of of um of uh free body volunteer work
they hired me on my 23rd day gave me a chance he had made my advocate it’s the
best best job I ever had from the only job that I felt like gave me a purpose you know to give back
and a chance to give back and help man this place has always been a blessing for me and uh thank God for everybody
else hit the lottery I want to give back um how when the person becomes homeless
for the assorted reasons how do they find Presbyterian night shelter how do they end up here is it a you guys go
find these these particular individuals are they find their way through Word of Mouth what leads them here word of mouth
is Big where they will encounter someone that is currently
homeless and they’ll say hey you need to go here or there in Fort Worth this section of Lancaster Avenue East
Lancaster it’s just downtown this is kind of known as the homeless Services
area and so if you’re on Camp Bowie or you’re in
Benbrook someone’s homeless say hey where do I go hey go to East Lancaster that’s where you can get help all of the
other service providers in the town in town know where the area is at and you
know we’ve been around for a long time as the other partner agencies and so they know where people should go and
surely send them this way you mentioned veterans earlier on in their talk how
many veterans are you seeing typically is that is that a a regular issue for
you guys because obviously there’s a whole other level to an individual that’s been a veteran end up in a
homeless shelter but is that a common thing for you guys it is a it is a it’s
consistent we’ve there’s always been homeless veterans and there always will be people that are veterans that end up
being homeless but I will say that the federal government over the last 20
years has really they’ve actually have done a very good job in helping homeless veterans
obtain the resources to end their homelessness when I started in 2009 we had 64 beds dedicated to homeless
veterans now that is 30 and we average about 25 men in that program and the
reason why it’s decreased is because the support that’s been provided from the federal government to help veterans exit
homelessness has really increased and so I know they get a bad rap because well why why
homeless veterans um but I will say if if if you were honorably discharged and you really want
to exit homelessness as a veteran the federal government really helps you do that you mentioned the time of day that
you’re having people in in the shelters and in here doing programs and things but people are not here because you’re
not sure where do they typically go we see a lot on the street as we’ve walked in I know that’s pretty common around this part of the town but where do
generally people go when they’re not a presbyterian night show during the during the day day times so in our programs we have
each night we have capacity for 725 Believe It or Not only 130 of that 725
have to leave our shelters every day in the morning we have a hundred overnight beds for men and 30 overnight beds for
women those individuals that all they really want is a bed for the night so
they come in at three in the afternoon they leave between seven and eight the next morning the rest of the people are
able to stay in there in the shelter in their location and so a lot of the people are staying inside the shelters a
lot of people work a lot of people go out trying to secure the resources they need in their homelessness so you get a
lot of exit where people go on a variety of locations but you certainly have people that will go and hang out outside
majority of people you’ll see hanging around the shelter are unsheltered meaning they they would rather sleep
outside than come into the shelter yes sir could you you just kind of described it I think already but the day-to-day at
the shelter it’s kind of a it’s an Ever moving tide if you will if you could you
describe briefly how what the day-to-day looks like as far as I mean you have a line of people in the morning or a lot
of people in the afternoon what’s the general look of this place from a day-to-day perspective
between um 6 a.m and 7 A.M you’re going to see a
lot of people showing up lining up into the lineup to our day shelter where we’re located and this day shelter is
very busy from 7 A.M until a little bit after lunch which is um about 12 30. a
lot of people inside getting the services that they need to secure whatever benefit they need so there’s a
lot of activity in the morning kind of slacks off a little bit for a couple of hours until three o’clock comes when
people are returning to the to our overnight shelters and so tied a a wave
is a good way because it kind of a tide go in and out typically early in the morning and then later in the afternoon things kind of swell back up nice
um success stories you’re seeing around here you mentioned that before that we started the interview can you can you
kind of outline some of the successes you see that are not just not just random acts but you people are are
finding help through Presbyterian National we know this what is that General story look like I think it looks
like um one is the number of people that come here every night for shelter
um we have capacities for 7.25 I’ve said that several times we’re averaging
anywhere from 675 to 725 so around 700
people is what we’re seeing each and every day that’s a success it’s a place for someone to stay last year we housed over like I
mentioned 1600 and two people exited homeless since last year into their own home that’s a significant success for
people leaving this lifestyle and I you may ask it later but our
social Enterprise social Enterprise our Employment Program is really a really
good program we have 176 positions full-time positions in that department
for people that are currently or formerly homeless or those that are have some barrier to employment to get
full-time full benefit jobs with the average salary being 14 an hour 176
positions and of last week we had 169 employees just in our employment program
it’s people living in the shelters it’s people that have moved out of the shelter and can still work for us so
that’s a huge success because it helps people get back into the workforce I
think work brings dignity it brings purpose it brings a reason for getting up working hard being tired there’s
dignity in that and it helps people have a sense of purpose and feel like they
are just like everybody else and so we really put a lot of emphasis on that because it’s powerful in helping people
in their homelessness yes indeed my name is Tish super sinsky and I came here
after I got evicted um my daughter got into trouble at the apartments we lived in and I got
convicted because of that the shelter is helping me get uh my apartment I should
be leaving here in about a week or two and I’ve been here a year and a half I’m
pregnant they got good benefits my name Calvin um I got here from not not just giving
up not working that you know what I’m saying not having faith you know just just gave up but they they
will give you resources to help you pns light shelter y’all come out here if y’all don’t have nowhere to go and they
will try they will succeed and that’s nice I’ve been out here for like a
couple months almost a year I got a bit in my apartment they mean a lot there’s
some structure going on and everything but they helping yeah the homelessness problem in general
is it is it a fair question to ask you is the Homeless Problem I think I know the answer but uh from
someone who lives at day to day is the problem getting worse is it getting better are we making a difference are
these type of programs making a difference in in the when the our country as a whole as far as
homelessness is concerned um I think so because I live it every day
and I see it you’ll certainly have those that will say no way because one
homeless person is too many for some you’ll see that but some of the facts will show that we are making a
difference um Fort Worth is the 13th largest city in the country it’s the fastest growing
city in the entire country this past year and if our number of homeless were
to have kept up with the growth of this city we would have far more than what we have the 2500 we’d be closer in line
with Chicago or other major cities that are much more have much more population
than what we do so the situation certainly
is fluid and ongoing we had last year we housed them as a system not just the
Presbyterian night shelter but as a system we house more people than we’ve ever housed in the history of our of our
local community but the number went up even though we were housing far more people
on the same token locally in Fort Worth rent went up average 300 a month
compared from 2022 to 2021. 300 a month so if you’re making
13 12 13 14 an hour and your rent goes up three hundred dollars over the year
before and your income didn’t go up that much per month you are really getting squeezed out of the housing market in
Fort Worth we have we have a serious affordable housing crisis and until we
get serious about creating affordable housing and if we get serious about
overcoming nimbyism I promise you no matter where we go in this city every
single neighborhood is opposed to any type of specialized housing whether it’s homeless related housing or it’s veteran
related housing or it’s senior 55 and up housing there is not a neighborhood in this in this city that wants specialized
housing and so until we get over that bias and the nimbyism that comes and
that and frankly the Discrimination that comes from all angles we will continue to see a rise in homelessness because
wages have not stayed have not gone up with the rise in rent and we really have
an affordable housing crisis here’s an example of that we have capacity in our family program right now for 40 families
but in Tarrant County for right at a year we have a silent family houses
crisis going on we have 40 spots we have been over capacited we now average 44
families we’re doubling up in four of our rooms the Salvation Army they have on a
regular basis they have capacity for 90 people that’s about
12 to 14 households and the rest would be children to get a total of about 90.
they had over 300 people last week of families and they had about I think it
was 52 families staying in motels so there is a silent family crisis going on
here’s the rest of that example in our family program we have 44 families right
now 41 of our families have been matched with a Housing Voucher meaning they have
financial support to move into an apartment 41 of our 44 families they
have money ready to go to go out and move into an apartment but they cannot
find an apartment because there is a lack of affordable housing in this city and so that’s why we’re going to
continue to see an increase because if we have the money to help people exit and there’s not a place for them to go
you’re going to continue to see more people out on the streets let alone having the shelters be full for sure
let’s talk about money for sick since we’re on that topic Pro steering not sure it was a non-profit you guys
operate off a budget can you share with us the the annual budget for the for the night shelter this year our budget is 18 million
dollars and we have four primary funding streams number one is we have about 7
million in government grants that we receive and then um we have private giving Which is
broken down by individuals or foundations we also have we get support from our
endowment about a half of 500 000 a year for that and the remaining balance of that is our six million dollars worth of
income our money we bring in from for from our social Enterprise program so um
we that’s a very large portion of our of our overall budget and uh any net profit
comes straight back to support the organization so our total budgets right about 18 million are you of the opinion
that if if we had all limited funds the problem of homelessness could be solved
is it a is it a money funding problem at this particular juncture I know you said affordable housing is the major concern
but if if money just came pouring in and housing were available could we solve
this problem in your opinion that’s a it’s a very deep question
um oftentimes homeless service providers
[Music] are looked at solving the issue but we are we’re we’re
We Didn’t Start the issue started way before we before someone comes to our doors whether it’s the mental health
system it’s the Health Care system on and on and on so I think that if we had
unlimited funds you could and you had uh the perfect scenario where affordable housing was
not an issue you could certainly provide as as much speed as possible to take
people from the shelter into housing I don’t think it would necessarily solve all the issues that bring someone to our
doorsteps but it would certainly help us get people into housing much much quicker and the the resources needed to
kind of solve the stuff that leads to people to our doors that’s a that’s a big issue for sure
uh Toby forgive me for asking this but you strike me as a calm thoughtful person
um why do you do this why do you this is a this is a monster of a problem why do you put yourself in in this in this
segment of the world it’s it’s an incredible thing you’re doing but why do you do it um I do it frankly because of uh from my
faith as a as a Christian um I feel like I feel called to do this
I feel that scripture is very clear in my opinion uh on love God and love your
loved your neighbor and this is to me is a clear example of loving your neighbor
there the scripture’s full the life of Jesus time and time again
he went to those that were really in need and whether it was the woman at the the well or the or the Widow that brings
brings her her child or whether it is the lady that reaches out and touches
Jesus because she has a bleeding disorder on and on and on he went to those that needed him the most and
um I felt for a long long time in fact since college that this was the area that um
that I felt like was was for me I can appreciate that very much
I see that you’re married I know you have children you’ve shared a little bit of that off off camera but how do you
take this every day dealing with some really harsh hard truths how do you go
home and be a husband and a dad is is there a is there a switch you can flip because this doesn’t sound like
something you can easily step away from at home is there a is it a difficult thing to take this home with you
um it depends on the issue uh frankly and it depends on on what’s going on
my wife and I celebrate 30 years this summer congratulations a huge thing for us we have five children
um so we have a basketball team not quite a footballer a soccer team but uh
we’ve got a basketball team worth the kids um it really depends on what what is going
on as far as what I bring home I’ve certainly learned over the years
how to let the day-to-day not impact us as much and impact me as much because
you see it over and over and and it it just becomes kind of the normal
working environment of a lot of the things that you see
and so I am I’m good about it on a lot of things and then frankly I’m not very good about it in certain areas and
there’s more pressure than just what you see with our guests there’s a lot of other pressure that comes along that uh
oftentimes causes me to have some sleepless nights for sure
um I I got here after uh getting robbed in Dallas I had some things that I was supposed to
bring back to New Orleans and uh I try to get into recovery it didn’t
work for me and the relapse real hard uh with no support system I I started
quickly going back to drugs but before um before I I went back into a full Supreme
just I got us a note from Oscars stole my chicks man and kicked me out so
this is where I’m at I’m they’re trying to help me get housing oh trying to help
me find jobs try to get off the street I want to be in here four months my name is Jennifer pallotte and I uh came here
because I’m suffering from anxiety and depression and um things just kind of
spiraled out of control and that’s what got me here and um
the night shelter they’re they’re doing something by letting me have a place to stay and and everything and I get more
meals and all that struggles for the Presbyterian night shelter what are your some of your biggest struggles
well it depends on a lot of things but money is always an issue having enough
resources to do what we do is is really a big big deal
so always wanting to make sure that cash flow is strong and our grant
reimbursements are timely and we’re soliciting funds from the community and and being really good stewards of that
we’ve got to be good stewards of what’s been entrusted to us so that is one that is always on my mind there’s
homelessness is a very political issue and there’s pressure in all of those
circles so keeping that in balance is also one that creates a lot of stress and then there are certainly situations
that will pop up that create a variety of activities our housing
department we have a very strong housing program where
about 175 people lived throughout the city of Fort Worth to where we still provide weekly
assistance for them whether it’s help Financial financially for their rents or it’s the personal support to help them
be successful in their housing over the last six months we have we’ve had our staff have experienced eight
deaths in that program some of them who are natural deaths others were not so much and that can be
very very challenging and so there are certain events that will pop up that
create a little more emotional difficulty than than the
normal day-to-day sure um when people are inside Presbyterian night shelter
um generally are they getting along are they to themselves just I’m curious on
how the general Mantra is for somebody that’s staying here because they’re all dealing with something major in their
life without question are they do they interact freely do they help one another
generally or what’s what’s the general demeanor for somebody all of the above and that’s not a cop-out it’s all of the
above um the the in the shelters generally everyone gets along pretty well
but we have incidents every day we have we average write it this is
amazing but we average right at eight MedStar calls a day so we have a
significant and really I think there has been a I’m off topic a little bit but there has certainly been a change since
covet we noticed this during the tail end of covet and then
definitely after there has been a big change in our population and you’ll
notice that when you go outside you’ll see the number of wheelchairs and Walkers there has been a shift much more
medically fragile population much older population than we had prior to covid and so that I think is attributed to the
number of MedStar calls per day some of those calls certainly are you and me we
wouldn’t go to the emergency room for stomach ache or whatever there’s no options for people
that stay in a shelter but there are some real serious medical calls that we get one we had a possible heart attack
last night in the men’s building where a gentleman left to go go to the hospital because of that we had other
things that popped up that people went to the emergency room last night as far
as behavior issues they happen and it happens every single day and
the pop the the the the guests in the shelter work well together to try to minimize that
um and then our staff do an incredible job managing that um so it’s kind of a
certainly wouldn’t say a tossed salad but more of a stew in a crock pot type of situation kind of all working
together so you get every experience on the day-to-day how many people work at prostate nut shelter
we have about almost 300 employees now again 170 of those are in our Employment
Program and the and the remaining of that would be working in our other shelter locations and the support staff
I read somewhere a couple weeks ago that the average age for a homeless person is
could certainly less than the average life expectancy for a for someone who lives in a home around 60 65 years
probably at the top level uh it’s for the obvious reasons I mean they’re living in under extreme circumstances I
think it has something to do with it but everybody talks about this it’s a Hot Topic across the country if not the
world homelessness we obviously struggle with it in the U.S what can people especially here in terencan what can
people like us do to help you said monies is always needed is it simply writing a check as you said people don’t
want to see it in their neighborhoods they don’t want to they want it out of sight out of mind but if we’re ever going to solve this is it is it people
writing checks and getting getting enough money to do all these things we speak of with housing
well um let me answer a little broader
we certainly if we do not have the money we’re not going to make a dent at all
and so financial support is is truly significant and we definitely need that
but for the individual you encounter on the streets or at the at the street corner
um I certainly don’t encourage people to give money to panhandlers
a lot of panhandlers in Fort Worth didn’t used to be that way pre-covered majority of panhandling is is not
homeless individuals I don’t encourage it but I certainly encourage everybody to
make eye contact say hi give away for how are you doing no matter the
situation the person that you see that’s homeless they are people and they have good days and they have bad days and I
guarantee you they have had a life that none of us would want to live so any
type of nice word or just uh showing showing Humanity I guess or
showing being a good neighbor that’s certainly one thing that certainly encourage on the individual
basis I think getting educated about the issue and being willing to support
efforts for housing support efforts for for helping us or all the agencies
helping people find a place to stay so educating yourself understanding that
having frankly having homeless people live in your neighborhood is not going to bring the neighborhood down it just
won’t every area where there’s been a Housing Development has brought the property
values up in this city although the opinion’s the opposite so I think supporting those efforts learning about
the issue being kind to the homeless individuals you see and then of course financially is very important but
volunteering we need volunteers to do what we do we’re about to serve dinner in just a minute and we always need
volunteers to help us serve dinner Christmas time we always need that one thing that we often forget on donations
it’s getting hot our kids are out of school they like to go swimming so
swimsuits pool toys those sort of things are forgotten when you think about homeless
children but that’s something that we near you during the summertime so um those are a few ways I would say you
could do that wonderful all the years you’ve been doing this Toby is is there any is there a special memory you’ve
made from somebody that’s been through here or any particular come to mind of an event or a person that’s come through
here that’s that you can’t ever forget about in a positive way yeah I mean yeah
there is a there frankly there’s a lot of those um knowing that
so many people have exited homelessness and have not returned because we help them get into a house I mean there’s
there’s a lot of examples like that there was a this happened last fall
um well it was more close to Christmas time a gentleman that used to stay in the shelter he received assistance
got on disability because he was disabled he moved out and he came back to make a donation and
he wrote a check right there and because you guys gave to us I wanted to give back that’s a really special thing
knowing that we’ve had some very um difficult situations with guests where
they’ve overcome serious health problems and seeing them frankly still alive and
and living as successful as they can be on the out in their own home we have a
number of staff that used to be homeless that work for us there is a lady that I
work with I see her every day she’s been here 14 years she was homeless when she started and she’s still working for us
we have a number of them that do that several of them I see every single day those are success
stories well my name is
Arlington Memorial Hospital then I went upstairs to uh bet all things Desmond
did I want to check it out and uh and I’ll tell him yes and I want to say I guess I was there less than a week and
so they called they checked out my bipolar and stuff we had hard workers
TVs and stuff full of food and uh they called here all day because I needed
somewhere to stay so they just psychiatrist lady called here and somebody from here said yes bring her
over so on to my mom sent me here from Arlington in a cab to the lady to the uh shelter
right there at the women’s shelter you know this place is giving me a place to stay so far I’ve been already a meal and
a good shower and you know it feels fairly safe you know for the type of people that you
know to be in this car but you know so far so there’s a little sense of
unity here versus other places um other success stories are knowing
that um how we’ve established really good relationships with donors to where they
see the mission and they know that um we really try to do our best to honor
what’s been given to us to make a difference in partnership with our donors and knowing that they trust us is
a really big deal so there’s a lot of examples that you can that I could go to with with people’s faces and knowing who
they are and what they’ve done on the opposite you have the opposite too of um some situations where you just want to
say man I just wish you would
figure something out it’s it’s so easy to say that but addiction mental health is a very strong strong thing there is a
lady that sleeps outside now and she used to be in one of our housing programs and because of her mental
illness she chose to leave and uh we cannot convince her to come inside
during February it got cold around February 5th or 6th when it got so cold
couldn’t get her to come inside she would not I made every arrangement
come in come in I’ll let you stay wherever you want she didn’t want to so the best we could do is give her a
couple of extra blankets make sure she had a tarp to cover herself up from the snow so some of those that can be pretty
difficult there is a gentleman that stays off and on inside our shelter
he’s in his early 30s I’ve known him since he’s four years old I was his case manager when he was four at the previous
location and a very tragic situation dates back to his family and it’s I see
him quite often and that one’s a tough one to see just because I’ve known him for so long so you have the really great
successes and you have those that continue to to give you heart you know continue to tug on your heart
it’s oftentimes easy to overlook in blame get a job why don’t you just do
this or access to services and I get it I say that sometimes too just because you get so frustrated with some people
but at the end of the day there are people
with very difficult situations and none of us would want to walk in their shoes because it’s been so
difficult and so um almost every day that helps me
have the strength to overcome a lot of the difficulty and to um continue to show compassion before we go
on 42 we always ask our guests one final question that’s kind of a tough one but aside from Wedding Marriage children all
the things that involve family family and stuff because they’re our best day of your whole life
best day of my whole life that’s a good question I have a lot of good I’ve had a lot of
best days when I came to Faith that was buff that was a good day for sure I can
remember it specifically can’t say weddings can’t say births
I will say adopting our two youngest children that was a very good day
um seeing us develop build our Morris Family Center that was a good day
renovating our men’s shelter was a good day there’s been a lot and I’m hoping we
have a few more to go we are too we’re grateful for what you do for the City Fort Worth and Tarrant County
if we can ever be helpful how can people find you how can people be more involved what’s what’s the place to go the best
place would be our website journey home.org journey home.org is is the
place to find us well Toby Owen uh CEO Presbyterian night shelter thank you very much for joining the show thanks
for joining us we appreciate the time absolutely thank you very much [Music]
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