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Archives for 2020

Kristen Bloom of Refugee Assistance Alliance: For Refugees in South Florida, A Helping Hand

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With nine moves in just the last 15 years – to places as vastly different as Japan and Alabama – Kristen Bloom knows something about dislocation.

“I grew up in a small New England town. We would go to the market and see people we knew. There were people to lean on, neighbors and friends who are a strong network of help and support and compassion.

“I realized the importance of that especially over the past decade and a half, with all the moving around to places where I didn’t know anyone,” says Kristen, whose husband serves in the Air Force and is often reassigned. “Dislocation is my middle name.”

When she and her family landed in South Florida in 2017, and she came to know people within the Syrian refugee community there – and their struggles adjusting to new lives and meeting new challenges – it was natural her connection and sensitivity would move her to do something.

That same year she founded Refugee Assistance Alliance (RAA) to help refugees from Middle Eastern, African and Asian countries settling in south Florida – specifically in Broward and Miami-Dade Counties. RAA is a new grantee of The Good People Fund.

“I felt compelled,” Kristen says. “I know what it’s like to start over, but I don’t know the trauma. They have been through so much more than any of us can even imagine. They were in need of a support network that just didn’t exist here.”

In just the three years that it’s been operating, RAA and its corps of about 100 volunteers has helped close to 175 individuals – adults and children – as they strive to gain footing in a new landscape of language, bureaucracy, and custom.

While RAA places a high priority on teaching English to new refugees, it has established what Kristen calls a “holistic” approach to resettlement, recognizing that it is not just basic skills that lead to success, but also relationships, friendships and community.

That’s a challenge in the sprawling two-county region, she says. Compared to the large and thriving Spanish-speaking refugee communities there, Middle Eastern, African, and Asian refugees make up a relatively small percentage of the population and are often geographically isolated from one another – a fact that makes their needs even greater than just language skills.

“The refugees may only know three other families and they are all in the same boat, not established,” Kristen says. “It’s like the blind leading the blind.”

Knowing that, RAA also designs cultural events to build strong ties within the refugee community and to create exposures and learning opportunities for those beyond it; programs for refugee children to guard against isolation and to build long-lasting friendships; tutoring to assist children and adults in school and other learning environments to ensure advancement; and initiatives to help individuals and families navigate everything from citizenship and driving tests, to the healthcare system and emergency preparedness.

The need for building both practical skills and community is great, Kristen says, noting that while new refugees are typically under the wing of resettlement agencies, help usually ends after a relatively short three to six months. RAA gets referrals from these, the Florida Center for Survivors of Torture, Church World Service, and word of mouth.

As the coronavirus pandemic has hit communities hard since last spring, RAA has pivoted away from in-person visits to Zoom-based gatherings. The organization gifted laptops to each of its clients so they can remain connected and continue with virtual tutoring and visits.

In fact, all of the 47 school-age children who depend on RAA for academic tutoring advanced to the next grade level this year, a development that Kristen describes as “a huge victory during extra-challenging times.”

As an impact-maker in her corner of South Florida, Kristen is also involved in refugee issues nationally. She is part of the Hello Neighbor Network, a consortium of nine organizations similar to RAA throughout the country. The network was founded in 2019 and is supported by The Good People Fund.

The work of its member organizations will be more critical in coming years as the number of refugees entering the country is expected to increase, Kristen says.

“We are in uncharted territory. Many of us are less than five years old. There is no blueprint for what we are doing. So it’s critically important that we learn from each other and share best practices so we can best serve those in our communities.”

Ask Kristen to describe that one moment that made her know she was doing the right thing at the right moment and she doesn’t pause.

She tells the story of one refugee from Syria who was having such a hard time adjusting to life in the United States that she was considering going back to her homeland. But with the continuing encouragement, support and community she received from RAA, she stayed and earned her GED and is a role model of success and inspiration to her own children.

And that, Kristen said, is a success of the people-to-people connections that are at the heart of RAA’s mission and her own.

“People are just people, yearning for connections, and you don’t need the same culture or language or religion to get that,” she said. “Our ultimate goal is to build peace and understanding among the people of South Florida. I believe it’s harder to hate up close.”

By H. Glenn Rosenkrantz, for The Good People Fund

 

Larry Oleinick of Heart 2 Hart Detroit: Giving a Voice and a Face to the Homeless

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If you’re looking for Larry Oleinick on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, just spot the blue Chrysler Pacifica that’s parked in Hart Plaza in central Detroit.

It’s there that he and a small contingent of co-workers set up an oasis, of sorts, for dozens of people who are homeless or experiencing severe hardship.

Here, they find outstretched hands holding sandwiches and snacks, a cup of coffee, a needed new hoodie or pair of socks, and any number of other life-sustaining essentials.

But perhaps most importantly, they find a community. Because it’s in Hart Plaza, by the van, that they are known by their names, and they feel counted, and that means everything in a world that often shuns them or renders them invisible.

“The greatest gift we can give to people is letting them know they are not alone,” said Larry. “We do that by showing up.”

Larry founded Heart 2 Hart Detroit – a new grantee organization of The Good People Fund – in 2012, after a career in the dental supply business. Talk to him for any length of time, and it becomes clear how and why he landed in this place.

It was during his teenage and young adult years, after all, that his parents organized an extended-family project each Passover, setting up card tables in their suburban Detroit home and putting everyone on an assembly line to pack boxes full of matzo, candies, and other holiday items.

When that was done, everyone got a mapped-out route to deliver the boxes to those in need, including people in nursing homes and assisted living facilities.

“I was fortunate enough to have parents who wanted to get involved and help people,” Larry said. “They modeled this for me and it rubbed off. Kindness doesn’t just fall out of the sky, you have to make it happen.”

The turning point came for him one hot summer Tuesday off from work, when he decided in the moment to take a cooler on wheels and some simple snacks to downtown Detroit and see who he could help.

“I realized the comfort I could give by handing a bottle of water and a bag of chips and a minute or two of conversation to people with virtually nothing,” he said.  “Many of them had had one bad break and didn’t make it back and their lives went spiraling down. That could happen to any of us.

“I’d been thinking about it for years. I wanted to get out of the business world and do something to help people all the time. So I took the leap. You don’t need a degree for this. Just a heart.”

Heart 2 Hart Detroit was born and established very shortly after that. With monetary and in-kind donations, it reaches about 100 people every day out in the field, and has grown to the extent that in 2019 alone, it distributed over 14,000 lunches, 140 winter coats, 6,100 hygiene product items, 5,500 pairs of socks, and the list goes on. And, all from that blue Pacifica van parked in Hart Plaza and now other locations in the city as well, like parks, shelters, and largely abandoned streets.

The organization is firmly rooted in the belief that interactions with those it helps are not merely transactional. Indeed, its success and deep impact is fueled by trust formed between those it helps, and Heart 2 Hart Detroit’s staff and corps of volunteers.

“If you give people consistency and honesty and a smile, that goes a long way to build a relationship and grow friendship,” Larry said. “We go way beyond food and clothing, to honoring them with integrity as individuals, and finding out what is going on and how we might be able to somehow help.”

In fact, Heart 2 Heart Detroit has connected those it serves to community service organizations, rehab facilities, estranged family members, and even to potential employees. Larry freely gives his phone number to those he meets on the streets, a literal lifeline for some.

With the coronavirus pandemic affecting interactions and patterns nearly universally, Larry and his team are adjusting, but a level of intimacy has been lost, for now at least.

“There is now by necessity a lot of physical space between us and there are aspects that get lost when you can’t hug someone or talk too closely. There is a confidence and a trust that is lost. We make sure they are getting everything they need, of course, but it is a challenge. Hopefully we can make up for all that is lost soon enough.”

In the meantime, that blue Pacifica, with Larry at the wheel, will be there, as everyone who relies on it expects it to be. “Nothing will stop us,” Larry said.

By H. Glenn Rosenkrantz, for The Good People Fund

A Personal Note to Our Friends and Donors

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Naomi K. Eisenberger, Executive Director

A Personal Note to Our Friends and Donors

In July of 1967, I was taking summer courses at Rutgers University-Newark campus. My husband was also enrolled and we traveled together to “the city” from our safe suburban apartment.

Newark, or Brick City as it’s sometimes called, was once home to a significant Jewish population made famous by Philip Roth in many of his works. By 1967, Newark had become home to a large African-American population, poverty and despair, and an often-corrupt city government. Added to this toxic mix was the shadow of the war in Vietnam and riots that popped up across the country in opposition.

I don’t recall what specific incident it was that started Newark’s rioting, but the outcome is something I will never forget. I recall block after block after block, burned and destroyed, businesses looted and 26 lives lost. The city was an armed camp and classes, for at least a few days, were canceled.

Over the past several days, I’ve struggled with two things. Watching the pain and the destruction across the country, I can’t help but compare it in many ways to 1967, and I’ve felt nothing but anguish that over the intervening years so little has changed.

My second struggle is how to articulate it to you, our friends and donors.

Since its inception 12 years ago, GPF has strived to be all about creating “good,” and not navigate through the divisive or political. We’ve kept our focus on projects that uplift individuals and communities day by day with hope, dignity and a future.

Over the past four months we’ve worked together addressing the very real outcomes of a virus that has killed more than 100,000 people in the U.S. – many the weakest among us. Since Memorial Day, we face an uglier and more existential threat – the bandage holding this country together has finally fallen off and we are a nation standing on a very precarious ledge.

So the question is, how can we as individuals and as the GPF family not just respond, but alter our lenses, conversations and sensitivities in order to do our part to heal our communities and create a new and more enlightened reality.

Several days ago, I received an email from Lia Taylor Schwartz, the executive director of our grantee organization, Connections, which curates relationships between youth in New York City’s child welfare system and volunteer mentors. In it, she wrote:

“This is not an easy topic, but it is a necessary one. Many of us who have not personally felt the pain of racism have enjoyed the privilege of not having to engage in these challenging conversations. It can be terrifying to begin the dialogue and our immediate instinct may be to avoid or become defensive. I’ve personally been doing this work of undoing institutional racism professionally for over five years and each day I learn how much more I still have to learn. I implore you to push through this discomfort and begin the long journey of listening and grappling with topics of race and inequity …”

As we look to the future – one that begins now and not some undetermined time to come – I will be taking her sound advice, not only as an individual, but also from my seat within our GPF family. We will lean on each other, learn from each other, and together seek new opportunities to build out our circle of “good.” This is on all of us.

Please reach out if you need or want to talk. I’m here. I wish you a meaningful Shabbat Shalom.

Naomi

 

Good People ARE Great People

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The smiles on the faces of these dedicated hospital workers at  Montefiore Medical Center, Moses Campus, Department of Pharmacy say it all! Who knew that a steady delivery of all kinds of snacks would bring such joy? While doctors and nurses provide the hands-on life-saving needed to help in this crisis, it is the pharmacy department that prepares all the medications needed and races them to the floors. While their sign says “Good People are Great People” we think that they are the Great People!

Soup’s On…in the Days of Coronavirus

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Many of us are probably in the middle of preparing a pot of chicken soup—albeit a much smaller pot than we’ve prepared in years’ past.

As Passover approaches in but a few hours, we thought this beautiful story might bring some cheer as we celebrate a holiday alone and anxious about all that is happening around us. These two pictures were sent to us by Gideon Ben Ami, founder of Pesia’s Kitchen in Israel. Gideon, forever the entrepreneur and imbued with limitless passion for helping others, is intimately familiar with the “routine” hunger that pervades Tel Aviv’s poorest neighborhoods. And so, with no knowledge of the pandemic that was about to break out, took a donated Zim Lines container and turned it into a small kitchen—quite literally a soup kitchen.

With our help, along with others who understood his idea, in a matter of weeks that bare container was transformed into a clean and bright kitchen complete with commercial grade equipment and volunteer chefs. Since it opened earlier this week, the volunteers have been cranking out gallons and gallons of rich, nutritious soup and distributing it those in South Tel Aviv who now have little or nothing.

From all of us at The Good People Fund, Chag Pesach Sameach and next year, may we all be joined with family and friends once again.