Photo courtesy of Mark Rogers & Megan Rohrer
On Friday June 11th, Honoring Emancipated Youth (HEY) partnered with Project Homeless Connect (PHC) to present PHC’s annual Bayview Connect in collaboration with other community sponsors including Public Health/Southeast Health Center, Bayview Hunters Point Foundation, United Council of Human Services/Mother Brown’s Kitchen and Deloitte LLP.
Bayview Connect focuses on bringing critical services to the homeless population of San Francisco which many homeless would not be able to access otherwise. This year HEY and PHC decided to collaborate on this event in honor of National Foster Care Month, with the goal of addressing the needs of emancipating foster youth, who once they age out of the foster care system have a 65 percent chance of becoming homeless with the first 18 months. Many foster youth emancipate from the foster care system with no resources, support or money to help them make a healthy transition to adult hood and as a result they become disconnected and many times end up on the streets. This year HEY and PHC recognized the need to incorporate services to support this population and made a strong and successful effort to include foster youth servicing agencies as well as current and former foster youth themselves.
26 youth serving agencies came out to provide information, resources, and services targeted particularly at current and former foster youth, including:
JVS
Asian Neighborhood Design
Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center
B-Magic, BAYCAT
Bayview Hunters Point Foundation
California Court Appointed Advocates, SF (CASA-SF)
CHALK, California Youth Connection (CYC)
Department of Public Health (DPH)
SF Independent Living Skills Program (SF ILSP)
The DJ Project-Horizons Unlimited
A Home Within – Fostering Art
First Place for Youth
Legal Services for Children
Ladies in Power
Larkin Street Youth Services
Marriott Bridges
Office of the Foster Care Ombudsman
New Door Ventures
SF State Guardian Scholars Program
SF City College Guardian Scholars
SFUSD Youth Mental Health
SFUSD Foster Youth Services
3rd Street Youth Center & Clinic
With the help of the organizations, service providers, and volunteers present, over 1025 people accessed services at Bayview Connect, with 175 of those who were served being transitional aged youth ages 16-24!
Photo courtesy of Mark Rogers & Megan Rohrer
Here is a list how many people received a vast number of critical services at the event:
11 Banking Accounts
65 Benefits (Cal Works, Food Stamps, GA)
218 California State ID’s
200 Children’s Backpacks (Project Nite Nite)
32 Cal Works
51 Dental Treatments
124 Employment Services
387 Eye Exams and Glasses
17,499 lbs Groceries picked up at onsite Food Bank
62 Haircuts
57 HIV Tests
50 Legal Support Services
25 Mammograms
53 Massages
71 Medical Services & 26 Follow up Appts
52 Phone Calls & 102 Voicemail Accounts
27 SSI/Medi-cal
13 Substance Abuse, Mental Health & Methadone Treatments
28 Veteran Services
52 Veterinary Care and Pet sitting
32 Shelter & Stabilization
We were also able to give away many wonderful raffle prizes to families with children and some special prizes to current and former foster youth. All of the prizes were donated with a majority provided by HEY’s long-time partner, City Youth Now http://www.cityyouthnow.org/.
HEY would like to thank all those involved who helped make this event a reality! Homelessness is a real and serious issue, but with events like this we all can begin to make it more manageable especially if we connect emancipating foster youth to resources EARLY! The event was a huge success for partners and community members alike!
For more information about Project Homeless Connect and future events please check out their website http://www.projecthomelessconnect.com/
