Dphw Fall 2007 Newsletter

Dinner Program for Homeless Women (DPHW)

What’s Cooking Just a Few Easy Steps ...

Autumn 2007

The 20th Annual Fannie Mae Help The Homeless Walkathon Is HERE! DPHW Board of Directors Erika Barry, MPA, Ex Officio

Saturday, November 17, 2007 at 9:00 a.m. on The National Mall between 7th and 14th Streets NW The Help the Homeless Walkathon is the Dinner Program’s largest fundraiser of the year—our goal for 2007 is $50,000, but we can not achieve that without your help! Below are all the many ways in which you can help DPHW reach our goal and continue to meet the needs of our clients. Thank you for your loving support!

Kari Kirwin Bedell Rev. David Bowers David Bowman, PhD Diana Bruce, MPA R. Matthew Kelley, Esq. George Madill Anne K. Nelsen, PhD Ann Parnow Yvonne Rice

In this issue:

Register to Walk: Over 50,000 people gather each year on the National Mall for this event. Every walker counts! More feet on the street means more benefits for DPHW and the men and women that we serve. Once you register, consider asking your family and friends to sponsor you or organize your friends, your colleagues, your faith community, or even book Pre-Walk Breakfast club to walk on behalf of Saturday, November 17, 2007 DPHW. Why it matters: 7:30 - 8:30am 100% of your registration 309 E Street NW, Washington DC fee benefits DPHW. Plus, DPHW’s staff invites you to join us for a continental DPHW receives incentive breakfast before the Walkathon on November 17. Get to funds from Fannie Mae know other friends and supporters of DPHW over a hot based on the total number drink and tasty treat! of walkers that we recruit. We'll walk together from DPHW to the starting point of the Walkathon on the National Mall. Make a general donation: Can’t participate on November 17 but still want to be involved and support DPHW? You can make a general donation to “Help the Homeless” and designate it to DPHW. Just go to our website at www.dphw.org to find out more.

2007 Fannie Mae Walkathon Details

1

Letter from the Executive Director

2

In The News

2

PN Hoffman Golf Tournament Recap

3

Client Highlight

4

Halloween Party

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New Faces

5

Volunteer Corner

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New Programs

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Other Ways to Give!

Donor Spotlight

7

Wish List

8

For all federal employees and other workplace givers: DPHW has a new CFC code for 2007-2008: 56398 Our United Way workplace giving code remains: 8280

No matter how you choose to get involved, every dollar you give or raise goes directly to programs that help DPHW's clients break the cycle of homelessness and move toward independence.

Please remember DPHW when you pledge this year!

Letter from the Executive Director Dear Friends, This year is coming to a close with all of the same rollicking energy with which it began. Starting with our change in locations at the beginning of the year, 2007 has been a year of significant transition and exciting growth. If it has been a while since you were last at DPHW, you may be surprised at all of the new faces and programs that have been popping up. Having doubled our program hours and introduced comprehensive social services, DPHW is now uniquely poised to offer our clients the individualized support necessary to end their homelessness. I encourage you to take a look inside this issue of What’s Cooking to learn a bit more about our great new staff and neat new programs, and I hope that you come down to visit soon. We always have an extra apron available in our kitchen, but there are now more ways than ever to get involved. To all of our many supporters that have worked so hard to make this year a success, thank you! Your contributions of time and resources are enabling DPHW to directly impact the lives of DC’s homeless in many inspiring ways. With Gratitude, Erika Barry, Executive Director

In Memoriam: Florence Theresa Shorter, 1955-2007 For longtime members of the Dinner Program family, Florence was more than just a familiar face—she was a welcome source of humor, comfort, and hope. As DPHW’s Resource and Referral Specialist for seven years, “Flo” kept her finger on the pulse of the many different services and programs throughout the city, so she always knew the best place to send a woman to get her needs met. Having experienced homelessness herself, Florence offered our women great compassion and a wonderful model of peer success. Known for her no-nonsense BINGO calling on Sundays, Florence also had a love of poetry that she tried to share with our clients, helping to organize DPHW’s monthly poetry readings and contests. She retired from DPHW at the beginning of 2007. Soon after, Florence found herself fighting lung cancer, which she did with her characteristic strength, dignity, and wry humor. We are honored to have had Florence as part of our DPHW family, and know that her memory will live on in the hearts of the many people whose lived she touched. Flo, you are deeply missed.

Pulled From the Newsstand America’s Working Poor Stretching Paychecks To The Breaking Point As rent, food, and energy bills increase for today’s Americans, more and more people are finding that payday is not coming soon enough to meet their basic needs. This is affecting not only the poor, but also middle-income working families as of late. Double coupon day and space heaters are just not providing the savings families need to stretch their paychecks through to the

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next payday. The problem is likely to continue as heating bills and mortgage rates steadily increase. As a result, food pantries have been experiencing shortages over the past couple years. The number of families visiting food pantries and other emergency nutritional services has risen over 60% in urban areas in the past year alone. What is now beginning to grip middle America is an issue our clients face multiple times over on a daily basis. As this problem continues to plague our citizens, we ask you to continue your support of programs like the Dinner Program. Thank you for all you do!

What’s Cooking

Charity Golf Tournament Raises $50,000 for DPHW On September 27th 2007, PN Hoffman, a DC-area upscale property development firm, hosted a charity golf tournament to benefit DPHW at the beautiful Whiskey Creek Golf Club in Ijamsville, Maryland. The tournament was a huge success and raised $50,000 for DPHW! We would like to thank the PN Hoffman staff, subcontractors, and vendors who made this event possible with their dedication and generosity. We would also like to thank the following tournament sponsors for their incredible support:

Gold Sponsor ($8,000-10,000) Miller & Long Silver Sponsors ($5,000-7,000) The Carmen Group Struever Bros. Eccles & Rouse United Masonry Bronze Sponsors ($3,000-4,000) Colonial Electric, First Savings Mortgage Forest City Spartan Electric Wells Fargo

In addition to organizing and staffing the charity golf tournament, employees at PN Hoffman have also shown their support of DPHW by becoming regular volunteers in our kitchen. We thank PN Hoffman for their inspiring community involvement!

Autumn 2007

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Client Spotlight The Mask I Wear By Kelly Brevard

In life we all wear masks. Some are to enhance us, Some transform. The mask I wear is to hide. I hide the pain and sorrow of loneliness. I mask my pain with smiles and laughter. I shade all hurt like sunshades block out the sun. How do you wear your mask?

Mini-Walkathon And Halloween Party! On October 26th, the Dinner Program hosted a mini-walkathon to help raise money for the 2007 Fannie Mae Help the Homeless Walkathon. Over 150 clients came out to walk for the cause, and all of their registration fees (donated by DPHW’s Board and supporters)

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Creative Expressions, a new therapeutic group held every Tuesday after breakfast, is allowing our clients to express themselves through art. We are pleased to present a recently crafted piece from Kelly Brevard, a participant in DPHW’s Real Opportunity employment training and in the Creative Expressions group. Kelly has been an invaluable resource to the evening program, working alongside DPHW staff. Thank you, Kelly, for sharing!

will directly benefit DPHW. These walkers will also count towards our walker totals for Fannie Mae incentive funs as part of the Walkathon on November 17th. Thanks to DPHW clients, staff, donors, and volunteers for all of your support in raising these funds! After the miniwalkathon, all the walkers gathered back at DPHW for a scarily fun Halloween party! There was a delicious fried chicken lunch and carnival games, karaoke, a costume contest, and a dance-off! What’s Cooking

New Faces at the Dinner Program Sandra Lizarraga, Director of Social Services Sandra received a masters degree in clinical social work from the University of Michigan and is licensed in clinical social work; she also received a doctorate in clinical psychology from the Illinois School of Professional Psychology. Sandra worked for the Chicago domestic violence agency, Rainbow House, providing individual and group psychotherapy for women and children, assisting them in overcoming trauma, building positive self worth, and living lives free of violence. While working for Norwegian American Hospital, Sandra helped implement the programming for group and individual counseling and assessment for a brand new psychiatric unit serving an ethnically diverse, chronically mentally ill population. Sandra has over 15 years of experience including: creating and supervising mental health programs, working with a gang-intervention counseling program, providing psychotherapy, case management, mental health and psychological assessments to homeless men, women and children, veterans and survivors of all kinds of violence and abuse.

Krystal Nesbitt, P.M. Program Coordinator/Case Manager Krystal is one of our newest additions to DPHW. Before joining DPHW, Krystal worked for House of Ruth’s Reunified Families Transitional Housing Program facilitating psychosocial groups and providing case management support to homeless women and families in recovery. Krystal also worked at Howard University Hospital Mental Health Clinic, giving her experience working with Bi-Polar and Schizophrenic patients, doing patient intakes, and participating in psychotherapy groups. Krystal also brings experience working with youth with behavioral difficulties and assisting the coordinators at Sister2Sister/Hermana a Hermana. A graduate of Howard University, Krystal has a B.A. in African-American Studies and a B.S. in Psychology.

Bryan Norman, A.M Program Coordinator/Case Manager Bryan is the Morning Program Coordinator/Case Manager and comes to DPHW from N Street Village, where he worked for six months as a Program Assistant at their Luther Place Night Shelter. While Bryan worked at N Street Village, Bryan was also the Operations Coordinator for two and a half years at the National Building Museum. He was the primary liaison for the many government agencies and building tenants within the building. In his spare time, Bryan likes to volunteer as a dinner server with N Street Village which he has been doing for over a year now. He is very excited to become a part of the team at DPHW and looks forward to developing the many areas for which he is responsible, such as coordinating the morning program and building trust with the myriad clients to help them learn how to overcome the barriers to stable employment, housing and a life of integrity and respect. Bryan attended George Mason University in Fairfax, VA and received his Bachelor’s degree in Russian Studies.

Jackie Walker, A.M. Cook Jackie is the new A.M. Cook for DPHW. Jackie is originally from North Carolina, but was raised in Maryland in Prince George’s County. She worked for the District of Columbia government for over fifteen years, and then settled into retirement. Jackie recently graduated from culinary school through the DC Central Kitchen, and she joined the Dinner Program staff soon after she graduated in July. Having personally experienced homelessness in the past, Jackie is especially committed to making sure our meals our nutritious and delicious. Jackie loves to cook and bake, and she hopes to return to culinary school to learn how to be a pastry chef. She will be working with Managing Chef Kevin Holloway and all of our wonderful volunteers.

Brad Barfield, Development and Communications Intern Brad, who joined the DPHW staff in September, had his first experience with the Dinner Program as a kitchen volunteer with his AmeriCorps team in 2005. This team was sponsored by the National AIDS Fund, and as a member, Brad worked at Food & Friends for two years as their Client Enrichment Coordinator. Originally from Central Georgia, Brad graduated from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, with a BE in biomedical engineering, and is currently pursuing an MBA from George Washington University with a focus in nonprofit management and entrepreneurship. As the Development and Communications Intern, Brad assists the Executive Director in sustaining existing funding and exploring new opportunities to fundraise for DPHW, as well as helping to continue to enrich DPHW’s image through various media outlets. Autumn 2007

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Can you SNIP and CLIP? DPHW is looking for a volunteer or two with experience cutting hair so that we can provide free barber services to men and women on a monthly basis. Volunteers would need to be available during the daytime on weekdays. Come help our clients get ready for that next appointment or interview with a brand-new do!

DPHW needs a volunteer or group of volunteers with a vehicle to help transport food donations from Howard University to our facility at 309 E Street, NW from 3:30-5:00 Mondays-Fridays. This donated food saves DPHW more than $100,000 each year, so please sign-up for a day and help us out! Please contact Heather Prince Doss, DPHW’s Volunteer & Community Resources Manager, at [email protected] or (202)737-9311 x.504 if you are interested in learning More about this volunteer opportunity.

Please contact Heather Prince Doss, Volunteer and Community Resources Manager, at [email protected] or (202) 737-9311 x.504 if you can share this skill.

Volunteers from PN Hoffman

Donation PickUp Needed!

Volunteers from Cleveland Park Congregational Church

Volunteers from DC United

A Huge Thank You To Our Star Summer Volunteers! Sylvester Jackson Jack White Callie Markey Sarah Horn Anne Nelsen

Margaret Polski Erica Culler John Darnell Lucy Barber Zubin Patel

We Appreciate All You Do For DPHW And Our Clients! Page 6

What’s Cooking

offered during both the breakfast and dinner program, so men, as well as women, can keep themselves clean and healthy.

New Program Offerings The new social services staff at DPHW has been working hard to meet the many needs of our clients, ◊ both men and women alike. We want our clients to not only survive, but also to thrive. Thus, over the past few months, we have introduced many new programs and services. Here is a quick overview of what’s new! ◊

Expanded program hours: Monday-Friday: 8:30-11:30 a.m. (breakfast for men & women) Sunday-Thursday: 3:30-7:00 p.m. (dinner for women & kids)

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New Case Management services, designed to give clients the individualized support needed to reach their goals.

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Expanded laundry and shower services, now

Extended Computer Lab Access and Classes: Monday-Friday: 11:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m. (men & women) Monday-Thursday: 4:00-6:00 p.m. (women & kids)

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Three new support/counseling groups: Men’s group (Fridays) Women’s group (Wednesdays) Creative Expressions (Tuesdays)

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New Community Partnerships with local agencies to provide educational presentations and services onsite at DPHW: Whitman-Walker Clinic (preventative health); HIPS (STD prevention); Department of Veterans Affairs (veterans benefits & substance abuse treatment); Income Maintenance (food stamps & health insurance enrollment); and Calvary Women’s Services (transitional housing)

Recent Donors — Gifts That Keep On Giving Individual Donors Andrew King and Kathy Zurawski-King Barret F. Washington Donald and Mary Kathryn Cubitt Donald and Mary Ryan Edward and Kathleen Beal Francis and Sally Smith Frederick Walton James and Erna Sullivan Jeffrey and Pamela Dunn John and Dorothy Brennan John and Rosemary Colston Michael Garland Ralph and Dorothy Childs Richard and Norma Ronson Russell and Jean Donaldson, Cheryl Nichols Stephen and Faith Czecha Thomas and Catherine D'amour William and Anne Janson Ann M. Tierney Eileen Brennan Joan Darby and Richard Kjeldgaard Kathryn Salasin Marie Rice Mary Virgina Weschler Ricki Peltzman, Upstairs on 7th Beall Comstock Sherly Wilcox Autumn 2007

Terri Maureen Wade R. and D. Varney Lucy G. Barber Christopher O'Brien Keith and Nora Sylvestre

Foundations and Organizations Agua Fund Outreach Group, Shrine of the Blessed Sacrament Al-Huda School Chevy Chase Presbyterian Church Downtown BID Fabrangen Tzedakah Collective German Marshall Fund of the US Greenbelt Community Church Hillandale Volunteer Fire Dept Inc International Monetary Fund Little River United Church of Christ Metropolitan Community Church of Washington DC St. Raphael's Church The United Church Women's Missionary Society Naomi and Nehemiah Cohen Foundation, Inc. The Community Foundation for the National Capital Region Temple Sinai St. Alban's Episcopal Church Jack D. and Fredda S. Sparks Foundation The Jovid Foundation Page 7

Wish List Unfortunately, our budget does not always allow for us to purchase the daily items needed by our clients. DPHW relies heavily on donations of items for distribution to the people we serve. Below is a list of our most desperately needed items this fall. Like all gifts to DPHW, these donations are tax deductible. ◊

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Men and women's underwear (new) and bras (gently used) – especially in large sizes Socks (new) Feminine hygiene products Towels and washcloths Long underwear/thermals for men and women (new or gently used) Coats and heavy sweaters (new or gently used) Winter hats, scarves, and gloves Backpacks, duffel bags, hand carts, and rolling luggage

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Rain ponchos and umbrellas Men and women’s work/snow boots (new & gently used) Toiletries (especially hotelsized): ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊ ◊

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Soap Shampoo Deodorant Toothbrushes/Toothpaste Razors Lotion

Bus tokens and Metro passes Arts & Crafts supplies

Dinner Program for Homeless Women (DPHW) 309 E Street, NW Washington, DC 20001 www.dphw.org Building Community One Meal at a Time..

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