A ribbon cutting ceremony was held on Wednesday to open “The Journey House”. The “Journey House” is a place for young women to transition from foster care into the world. The facility will provide life-skills programs that will help the women to be successful in their lives.The non-profit agency, I Am Now, Inc, received the donated home from a Greensboro resident who wants to remain anonymous. The home is located on Rocky Knoll Circle in Greensboro. ‘I Am Now’ is an organization devoted to helping homeless youth in the Triad.

via Greensboro Homeowner Donates House To Non-Profit at digtriad.com

>> [link to video and story]

>> Read other ChosenFast.com posts about Don Ames

“Decisions about the homeless have, for years in Forsyth County, been made mostly by well-meaning people who have never spent a night on the street. Today, a group of homeless and formerly homeless people will try to change that. The Homeless Caucus, a group formed by the community-organizing group CHANGE, called a public meeting tonight to ask for two voting seats on the executive board of the Homeless Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County.”

Good for them! The ONLY experts on homelessness are those who’ve experienced it! It makes no sense for never-homeless individuals to create plans and policy for homeless people without the active involvement of currently and/or formerly homeless people at every stage of the process.

>> Read all of Homeless Want Seats on Coalition Board…

“His tough-love approach is one that works to motivate people to take responsibility for their actions. Participants start by sweeping the streets. A completed week then brings cards redeemable for food. Ten consecutive weeks brings greater incentives and rewards. For those who don’t miss a week, they can, during the course of a year, get help with medical and dental problems and even see a $3,000 bank account opened in their name while being provided with safe housing and help getting a real job.

What’s the catch? Accountability.

Backsliding is never rewarded. And there is another key component. Jay demands of everyone—random acts of kindness–like sharing some food, guiding a blind person across the street, helping an elderly person with their shopping…

Simple acts that remind us it isn’t how much you amass but what you are prepared to do for others that should define our worth as human beings.”

Keep reading: Could LA’s Jay Goldinger hold key to defeating homelessness?

Fretwork clock by Don Ames; image credit: IRC

From the IRC, Greensboro’s homeless day center:

The Interactive Resource Center will once again offer art, music and refreshments on August 5 as part of downtown Greensboro’s monthly First Friday celebration. Featured artist this month will be woodworker Don Ames who creates fretwork masterpieces using a drill press and scroll saw that he runs on solar power at his camp in the woods. Don’s most recent work, a 28-inch tall pendulum clock in the shape of a Gothic cathedral, will be on display at the IRC.

WHAT: First Friday at the IRC
WHEN: Friday, August 5, 6:00 to 9:00
WHERE: 407 E. Washington Street
For more information 336-332-0824 or info@gsodaycenter.org

The Interactive Resource Center is celebrating its first full month of operation in its new home with an art and music-filled Grand Opening!

Part of June’s First Friday event, this is a great opportunity to tour the newest addition to Greensboro’s downtown neighborhood, enjoy music and art made by the people who use the IRC’s services and their friends, and learn a little more about the good things that are going on right in our own backyard!

Featuring:

• Display of works by artists experiencing homelessness
• Local music
• Open Mic, and…
• Samples from the IRC’s just-published first-ever cookbook!

Where: 407 E. Washington Street, Greensboro
When: Friday, June 3, 2011, 4-8 p.m.

Download the First Friday Event Map here (pdf).

For more information, contact Liz Seymour: liz@gsodaycenter.org, 336-332-0824.

The IRC’s success depends on the support of the people just like you! Please consider making a financial contribution in honor of the grand opening. You may donate securely online here.

In the face of historic deficits, the nation faces unavoidable choices about how to balance needs and resources and allocate burdens and sacrifices. These choices are economic, political — and moral.

As Christians, we believe the moral measure of the debate is how the most poor and vulnerable people fare. We look at every budget proposal from the bottom up—how it treats those Jesus called “the least of these” (Matthew 25:45). They do not have powerful lobbies, but they have the most compelling claim on our consciences and common resources. The Christian community has an obligation to help them be heard, to join with others to insist that programs that serve the most vulnerable in our nation and around the world are protected. We know from our experience serving hungry and homeless people that these programs meet basic human needs and protect the lives and dignity of the most vulnerable. We believe that God is calling us to pray, fast, give alms, and to speak out for justice.

As Christian leaders, we are committed to fiscal responsibility and shared sacrifice. We are also committed to resist budget cuts that undermine the lives, dignity, and rights of poor and vulnerable people. Therefore, we join with others to form a Circle of Protection around programs that meet the essential needs of hungry and poor people at home and abroad.

Key Principles:

1. The nation needs to substantially reduce future deficits, but not at the expense of hungry and poor people.
2. Funding focused on reducing poverty should not be cut. It should be made as effective as possible, but not cut.
3. We urge our leaders to protect and improve poverty-focused development and humanitarian assistance to promote a better, safer world.
4. National leaders must review and consider tax revenues, military spending, and entitlements in the search for ways to share sacrifice and cut deficits.
5. A fundamental task is to create jobs and spur economic growth. Decent jobs at decent wages are the best path out of poverty, and restoring growth is a powerful way to reduce deficits.
6. The budget debate has a central moral dimension. Christians are asking how we protect “the least of these.” “What would Jesus cut?” “How do we share sacrifice?”
7. As believers, we turn to God with prayer and fasting, to ask for guidance as our nation makes decisions about our priorities as a people.
8. God continues to shower our nation and the world with blessings. As Christians, we are rooted in the love of God in Jesus Christ. Our task is to share these blessings with love and justice and with a special priority for those who are poor.

» Continue reading A Circle of Protection: A Statement on Why We Need to Protect Programs for the Poor

Homelessness doesn’t go on hiatus, but family shelters do? Trying to find out why gihn.org is “closed temporarily.”

And:

This is why family shelter closed – Greensboro Homeless Program Temporarily Closing Due to Costs http://t.co/zwojJ9Y

From the linked article: “…the average homeless person is 9 years old, and there is a common misunderstanding that the homeless population consists of mostly adults.” True. The economy is hitting everybody hard. But it’s extra hard to see kids suffer.

His texts:

Work has started on the Greenway here. What a transformation in less than 24 hours.

Trees’re gone. All chipped up. Big pile of wood chips.

I had hoped that they would save the large trees and not clear cut. I hoped they would be saved to enhance shade along the path.

Me, too. My friends and I have taken lots of photos there. I’m glad we did. It’s history now.

Coming soon: Photos of the same site minus the trees.

The Interactive Resource Center to open in New Downtown Greensboro Location Monday, May 2

The Newly Renovated Building Will Triple the IRC’s
Capacity to Serve People Who Are Experiencing
Homelessness in Guilford County

(Greensboro, NC) – Almost two and a half years after it opened as an emergency day shelter in rented space at Bessemer United Methodist Church, the Interactive Resource Center is moving to its permanent home at 407 E. Washington Street in downtown Greensboro. The 22,000-square-foot building, the former home of Southern Plate & Window Glass, was donated by the Richard Strasser family to the Community Foundation of Greater Greensboro in 2009 for the express purpose of housing a center to help people who are experiencing homelessness.

The Interactive Resource Center will open its doors at its new location at 8:00 a.m. on Monday, May 2. IRC staff, clients, board members and volunteers will be available from 8:00 to 12:00 for press interviews.

“This is a great day for Greensboro and Guilford County,” said Skip MacMillan, board chair of the Interactive Resource Center. “We are here today because of the support and encouragement from so many generous and compassionate people in our community.”

The new IRC offers such basic services as showers, laundry, lockers, respite, telephone access and mail room, but it also has a 20-station computer lab, job counseling, housing counseling, medical services and case management. One feature of the new building is four “flex offices” where community social service agencies can meet with clients at the IRC. The new building will allow the IRC to serve as many as 200 people a day.

The need for a day resource center was identified in 2007 as one of the strategies in Guilford County’s Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness. In early 2008 Greensboro City Councilwoman Dianne Bellamy-Small convened a task force of to plan a day center, and in January 2009 the Interactive Resource Center opened. Since it began operations the IRC has served more than 2,400 people.

The renovation of the building was funded by Guilford County, Neighborhood Stabilization Funds (procured by the City of Greensboro), the Cemala Foundation, the Tannenbaum-Sternberger Foundation, the VF Corporation, the Weaver Foundation and the Community Foundation of Greater Greensboro. Greensboro architects Moser Mayer Phoenix designed the plan for the renovation; construction was done by Brooks General Contractors.

The Interactive Resource Center is open Monday through Friday 8:00 to 3:00.

For more information, please contact:
Liz Seymour, Executive Director: 336-430-3125, liz@gsodaycenter.org
Lamar Gibson, Fund Developer: 336-686-1292, lamar@gsodaycenter.org

####