BIG NEWS!!
"Sometimes your only available transportation is a leap of faith" `Margaret Shepard
As many of you know, Street Angels was cultivated from friendship, hope and love for humanity. We started by handing out meals from the back seats of our cars and operating out of our homes and storage units. It is tough work most days, but none of that matters when we know our friends are counting on us to help them make it through another day.
Our families and friends supported this mission from the very start and so many others wanted to know how they could help. We gave our mission a name and took it to Facebook. Three and half years later, that Facebook group is over 6,000 members strong, that is 6,000 + people who care about our community and want to make it a better place.
Through your support the Street Angel mission began to grow in every aspect, from the number of friends we were connecting with to the amount of support we were receiving. And, it is this same support that gave us a platform to be the voice for those who were going unheard.
Some of the amazing accomplishments the Street Angels community has achieved since our inception in late 2015:
-Over 33,000 meals have been delivered to those who may have gone hungry.
- 29,553 pairs of socks were given to our friends whose feet were wet and weary.
- Over 2,500 warm and safe sleeps were offered to people with nowhere to go when temperatures were bitter cold. (In the two winters, 2015/16 & 2017/18, that Street Angels hosted emergency winter warming rooms.)
-953 individuals and families were transported from the cold streets to emergency winter warming rooms.
-Showers of Hope has provided over 200 individuals with the opportunity to take a shower.
-Street Angels has successfully advocated for:
Shelter funding in the amount of $200,000 to be restored to the Milwaukee County budget (2017); Hospital discharge policy reform regarding patients who are homeless (2018); Temperatures were raised for opening warming rooms from 10 degrees to 20 degrees (2018); The Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors passed a ‘Code Blue Emergency’ resolution urging and assisting warming rooms to open their doors at 32 degrees and below (2019).
To look at those numbers, it is pretty astounding. It says so much about the community we live in because all of this was accomplished on community support and volunteer time. Which leads us to our exciting news.
OUR BIG ANNOUNCEMENT:
Our growth as an organization has brought us to a pivotal point. In order to sustain our mission and maintain the organization’s growth, we realize it is time to transition from an all-volunteer operated organization, to one with two full-time staff members.
A few months ago we began the grant writing process to make this transition a reality and were so excited to recently be notified that Bader Philanthropies accepted our proposal for payroll funding. While we are still in the process of looking for other funding specifically for this transition, we have decided to go ahead and jump in head first.
As of June 1st, 2019, both Co-Founders of Street Angels Inc. (Shelly Sarasin and Eva Welch) will be employed full-time by Street Angels as Co-Executive Directors.
This is an exciting time for us and we want to thank everyone who has supported this mission in so many ways throughout the last few years. We always say, we are simply the vessels of a community that cares.
We wanted to give a special thank you to all of our board members, past and present, who have helped to make Street Angels what it is. Their dedication and perseverance have been inspiring and uplifting in so many ways. It is with your guidance we will be successful in helping our community. Thank you.
We are so excited to see what the future holds for our friends, our organization and our community. Wish us luck!
Gratefully, Eva Welch & Shelly Sarasin Co-Executive Directors Street Angels Inc.