Home. It’s the root our lives grow from. Our health, ability to find and keep a job, success at school, and connection to our communities is dependent on having stable housing. Yet across the Bay Area, finding and keeping a home has slipped out of reach for many people in our communities.
Our housing crisis has created a stark juxtaposition – construction cranes pop up to build primarily market rate and luxury housing, while tent encampments bloom on our sidewalks. The tents visibly remind us that our neighbors have lost their homes, but many more people experiencing homelessness remain out of sight – living in their cars or moving around to stay with friends or family when they can. People of color, particularly Black and Native Americans, have been especially impacted due to the long history of policies excluding them from equal access to housing, community supports, and opportunities for economic mobility.
What are communities doing to protect and provide stable housing for those at risk of losing their homes or experiencing homelessness? How are they protecting housing stability for long standing communities of color under pressure from gentrification? From stepping up rapid rehousing and prevention services, to providing more permanent supportive housing, to increasing navigation centers and better coordinating across systems that support people experiencing homelessness, cities around the Bay are intensifying their efforts to respond to the crisis.
Join us to:
- Hear from leaders in San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, and Santa Clara who are spearheading multi-faceted efforts to keep people housed, stably rehouse those experiencing homelessness, and provide the support our most vulnerable community members need to thrive
- Discuss the role philanthropy can play to support these efforts. This briefing is the first in a series that NCG will be hosting for our members in partnership with Funders Together to End Homelessness.
We hope you can join us for this important conversation.
Speakers
Joanne Karchmer, Deputy Chief of Staff and Director of Legislative Affairs at the Mayor's Office, City of Oakland
Joanne Karchmer joined Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf’s Office in August 2016 as the Deputy Chief of Staff and Director of Legislative Affairs. In addition to managing the Mayor’s Office priorities for local, state and federal legislation, in 2017-18 she has focused on Oakland’s response to homelessness and on immigrants’ rights issues. She began working in Oakland city government as a City Council policy analyst in 2006. From 2012-2015, she worked at the Port of Oakland in government affairs. Prior to her work in Oakland, she was both a public interest attorney and the Executive Director of Career Development at UC-Berkeley School of Law. Joanne earned her undergraduate degree at Cornell University and her J.D. at Boston College Law School. She also serves on the Board of Directors and Governance Committee for the East Bay Agency for Children.
Jeff Kositsky, Director, Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, City of San Francisco
Jeff Kositsky is a nationally recognized leader in innovative homeless services and has over 20 years of experience managing nonprofit organizations in San Francisco. From 2013, he served as the executive director of the Hamilton Family Center. During his tenure, the organization expanded its rapid re‐housing program and developed an innovative partnership with the San Francisco Unified School District to prevent and end homelessness among school children and their families. From 2001 to 2010, he was executive director of Community Housing Partnership, a nonprofit affordable housing developer in San Francisco. He has served on several nonprofit boards, including San Francisco’s Coalition on Homelessness and the Treasure Island Development Authority Board of Directors. Mr. Kositsky holds a Bachelor’s degree in Economics and International Relations from American University in Washington, DC and a Master’s degree in Public Affairs from the University of Texas.
On May 11, 2016, Mayor Edwin M. Lee announced the established of the Department of Homelessness & Supportive Housing and appointed Hamilton Family Center Executive Director Jeff Kositsky to lead the new Department that will help homeless residents permanently exit the streets and move into housing and services.
Jennifer Loving, Chief Executive Officer, Destination Home
Jennifer Loving has spent her career spearheading efforts to better serve the needs of homeless individuals and families in Silicon Valley. Working in a variety of shelter, street and housing programs, Jennifer has developed and collaborated on numerous innovative models including the County’s first Housing First program for homeless families and the Housing 1000 Campaign, which brought more than 1,000 chronically homeless men and women home. A leader in systems change, she’s overseen the development and implementation of the 2015 Community Plan to End Homelessness and the production of Home Not Found, the most comprehensive cost of homelessness study completed in the United States. In 2016 she facilitated the release of The Silicon Valley Triage Tool, an open source predictive forecasting tool for Supportive Housing. Jennifer is a senior fellow with American Leadership Forum and is on the board of Silicon Valley at Home. In 2016, Jennifer was appointed to the Board of Commissioners for the Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara and appointed by the California State Senate to serve as a member of the State of California Homeless Coordinating and Financing Council.
Jennifer holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in counseling psychology from California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo, and is a graduate of the Harvard Business School’s Strategic Perspectives in Nonprofit Management program.
Jacquelyn McCormick, Senior Advisor to the Mayor, City of Berkeley
A community leader, Jacquelyn McCormick is a devoted organizer and activist. After running the successful campaign for Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguin she joined his staff as his Senior Advisor. One of her focused policy areas is homelessness. Since taking office less than 2 years ago, Jacquelyn has spearheaded the development of a plan to address homelessness in Berkeley through better coordination of service providers, opening of the first East Bay navigation center and increasing resources within the City of Berkeley and countywide. Her commitment that all people should have equal access to housing, social and health services, combined with drive and compassion turned her into one of the most vocal advocates for the homeless in the East Bay. Ms. McCormick lives with her husband in Berkeley and has a daughter and son-in-law who live in Brooklyn, NY.
Cynthia Nagendra, Director, the Alliance Center for Capacity Building, National Alliance to End Homelessness (moderator)
Cynthia Nagendra is the director for the Center for Capacity Building at the Alliance. Her experience includes providing assistance to communities around the country in implementing HEARTH, building system capacity to provide effective rapid re-housing, facilitating Continuum of Care processes, developing 10-year plans to end homelessness, facilitating system-level strategic planning and design, the planning and implementation of coordinated assessment systems and improving data systems to measure system performance. Before working at the Alliance, Ms. Nagendra worked as a staff attorney for HomeBase, The Center for Common Concerns. She also was a program manager for the St. Anthony Foundation Learning Center with homeless individuals and families in San Francisco. She has performed legal and policy work related to women’s rights, immigration and re-entry programming in New York City.
Mayor Libby Schaaf, Mayor of the City of Oakland
Mayor Libby Schaaf was inaugurated into office in January 2015 and launched an agenda to elevate one of America’s most diverse and progressive cities into an equitable and resilient city. Born and raised in Oakland, Schaaf immediately led new initiatives to offset the cost of living crisis, reduce crime, improve transit and infrastructure, and expand educational and career opportunities for the city’s most vulnerable residents. She developed Oakland’s “17K/17K Plan” to protect 17,000 low-income households from displacement while producing 17,000 new housing units by 2024. She created the city’s first Department of Transportation, an urban design unit to connect safe streets with housing and transportation. She also championed Measure KK, a $600-million infrastructure and affordable housing bond, which Oakland voters passed with 82 percent approval. Mayor Schaaf received national attention for launching the Oakland Promise, an education initiative that will triple the number of college graduates from Oakland by 2025. To date, the program has sent 1,000 high-schoolers to college with scholarships, and will soon provide every baby born into poverty in Oakland with a $500 college savings account. Mayor Schaaf is an Aspen Institute-Rodel Fellow in Public Leadership, a diverse and bi-partisan group of “the nation’s most promising young political leaders.” She is a member of the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative for mayors, and has worked with the Rockefeller Foundation to ensure Oakland is among the foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities.
Co-sponsors
Funders Together to end Homelessness is a national network of more than 230 foundations and United Ways dedicated to ending and preventing all forms of homelessness by supporting strategic, innovative, and effective solutions. Funders Together works to expand philanthropy’s impact and influence to advance the movement to prevent and end homelessness. Membership is open to all private funders currently engaged or interested in funding homelessness or related areas. Funders Together, an approved 501(c)(3), is a virtually based in organization. For more information, visit www.FundersTogether.org.
