Father John Felice, Governor Mario Cuomo, Richard Surles, Barbara Sabol, Mayor David Dinkins, Bill Jones, and Nancy Wackstein at the historic signing of the first NY/NY Agreement

As most of our community knows, NY/NY was the 1990 historic joint commitment by the State and City that created 3,615 units of supportive housing for homeless mentally ill people in New York City. It was the largest housing initiative for homeless mentally ill people in history and, at its peak, significantly lowered the shelter census.

 

But it did so much more.

 

Not only was NY/NY the largest investment in supportive housing in the nation by far, and it was made when the model was in its infancy. Less than a decade earlier, pioneering nonprofit organizations (like St. Francis Friends of the Poor, Committee for the Heights Inwood, Brooklyn Queens Catholic Charities, Goddard Riverside Community,  Community Access, Project FIND) had realized that in order to end homelessness for those with psychiatric disabilities, decent, affordable housing and on-site services were the key. Only 1,000 units of supportive housing were up and running in NYC in 1989, and the funding for that housing - to rehab decrepit SROs, to subsidize rent for the poorest people and to pay for on-site services - had been cobbled together from a plethora of disparate funding streams.

 

Amanda Tiana Pumarejo (in orange top) with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Moises Belizario of CityKids Foundation, and Joel Colon of The Door (in grey top), with kids from The Door and the CityKids Foundation Photo credit: Jane Feldman

Here's an article we don't get to publish every month: their Royal Highnesses, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, visited with a group of young people from Network member, The Door, including several residents of supportive housing!

 

The Duke and Duchess are founders of the Royal Foundation, dedicated to the well-being of young people, among other issues, and were interested in seeing what strategies are working here in the U.S. to address the needs of disconnected youth.     

 

The Door's Deputy Executive Director David Vincent told the Network how the visit came about: "Before visiting New York, the Palace contacted the Rockefeller Fund to ask for recommendations of organizations doing work on this front." The Rockefeller Fund, although not one of The Door's funders, gave their work a hearty endorsement.

 

The Duke and Duchess's visit with young people from The Door and CityKids Foundation gave them a chance to see first-hand New York City's innovative, effective models for supporting young people in need.

 

One of The Door's supportive housing tenants, Amanda Tiana Pumarejo, shared a few details from her meeting:

 

"The Duke and Duchess came in and shook our hands, and we got right into the conversation. I talked about how The Door really helped me get my life back together. I was in shelter for a long time at Covenant House, then The Door found me housing and supported me getting back into school. I'm going for my high school equivalency diploma now and I'm a single mother, I've got a 4 year old daughter and I really needed that support."

 

Ms. Pumarejo said the Duchess complimented her for accomplishing so much while being a single mom, and that that the Duchess' kindness and enthusiasm really meant a lot to her.

Mark Hurwitz, Chief Legal and Strategy Officer of SUS, and Donna Colonna, CEO of SUS

Services for the UnderServed (SUS) and Palladia merged last month and created an innovative and powerful organization with projected annual revenue of $180 million to address the needs of NYC's most vulnerable residents by offering supportive housing with health and human services.

Donna Colonna, former CEO of SUS, leads the merged organization, which will be called SUS, while Mark Hurwitz, former CEO of Palladia, assumed a new role as Chief Legal and Strategy Officer for SUS.  Palladia's current programs will be re-branded.  

 

"Palladia came to SUS in a forward-thinking move.  We are living in a very dynamic environment now and Palladia was looking for the right partnership in which to build both breadth and depth in an environment where money is tight. At the end of the day we have shared values," said Ms. Colonna.   

 

"The need for fresh solutions and effective approaches has never been greater," added Colonna. "We cannot ignore the scale of our challenge, with close to 60,000 homeless people living in shelters each night, 43% of whom are children."

 

"This merger has been a collaboration of the highest order, and may stand as a textbook case of a thoughtful, strategic and powerful alliance," said Hurwitz.

Dunn Development and SUS selected