Dear Friends,
Over the past few years, caring supporters like you have shown the best of what it means to be a neighbor by:
- Giving generously so Miriam’s Kitchen could keep our doors open throughout the pandemic and provide reliable, critical care to our neighbors experiencing homelessness
- Understanding that our strength as a community is bound up in the equity of others
- Pushing for a more just community where every person has a safe place to call home
I am so grateful for compassionate partners like you who have donated your time, talent, and treasure to advance our shared vision of ending chronic and veteran homelessness in DC.
Together, we successfully advocated for more than 2,400 new permanent supportive housing vouchers in DC’s 2022 budget – four times more than the year before!
With these vouchers in hand, we have a generational opportunity to end chronic and veteran homelessness in Washington, DC.
Your continued support is needed to help capitalize on this moment. If you’re able, please give generously to help scale up programming at Miriam’s Kitchen so we can turn vouchers into apartment keys as quickly and as equitably as possible.
Specifically, your investments will help Miriam’s Kitchen:
- Expand our housing program: We will add 10 new members to the housing team to support 325 residents (an increase from 220). The housing team works closely with each resident to build back community connections, strengthen life skills and self-sufficiency, and improve overall health. The team has consistently provided quality wraparound services such that 95% of residents remain stably housed after one year.
- Amplify our street outreach: Miriam’s Kitchen will add six new members to bolster our street outreach work to reach guests where they are, provide urgent assistance, and support them through the arduous path to housing.
- Change systems: Miriam’s Kitchen has played a critical role in helping guests more quickly exit homelessness through our leadership to secure unprecedented housing resources in DC’s budget and address gaps in our homeless services system. In the coming year, we will expand our team and work to more deeply address root causes of housing instability, like DC’s severe lack of affordable housing and a criminal justice system that both predisposes individuals to homelessness and then criminalizes their homelessness, creating a vicious cycle.
This is a pivotal moment for Miriam’s Kitchen and our city. Your support helps to make sure we have the right tools in place to build on this momentum and reach functional zero.
Thank you for being a part of the Miriam’s Kitchen community.
Sincerely,
Scott Schenkelberg
President & CEO
For more information on how you can support Miriam’s Kitchen, click here.
