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Dear Friends,
Ten years is a long time in Silicon Valley. Within the past decade, hundreds of products have become obsolete. Those that have survived — and even thrived — are built on a strong foundation, meet a continuing need, and are constantly evolving into more efficient and effective versions.
Next month marks the beginning of the Opportunity Center’s (OC) 10th anniversary year. Designed to meet the needs of extremely low-income people experiencing or at risk of homelessness, the OC is as important today as it was 10 years ago. In fact, with the cost for even the smallest studio in the Mid-Peninsula soaring out of reach, the OC’s affordable apartments and on-site supportive services are more relevant now than at any point in its history.
Creating the Opportunity Center was the shared purpose that catalyzed concerned, caring individuals to coalesce as Community Working Group (CWG) in 1998. The passion, determination, and vision that drove CWG to mobilize the expertise and resources to build the OC — the first permanent supportive housing project in Santa Clara County — have continued to propel us forward, turning Alma Garden Apartments into an affordable complex and then building 801 Alma Family Housing to provide affordable homes for 50 families in our community.
Since the OC opened its doors almost 10 years ago, it has housed approximately 200 men, women and children and provided services for 550 people each year. Thanks to our partners and our community of supporters, we have helped improve and transform lives and futures, and we will continue to do so. People are healthier, safer, and happier, because of your willingness to join with us in our efforts. Our supporters have helped create a Silicon Valley product with true staying power.
As we recognize the OC’s 10th anniversary, we look forward to reflecting on lessons learned, celebrating success made to date, and sharing plans for a new decade of service. Look for more in future editions of “Thresholds”!
Thank you for your caring support.
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John Barton
Board President
Community Working Group
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Partnering to Save Buena Vista
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About 400 Palo Alto residents, including about 130 children, may get to stay in their homes in the Buena Vista Mobile Home Park, one of the only affordable housing options in the city. In late June the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors unanimously supported a partnership between the County, Palo Alto, and the County Housing Authority to acquire the park and preserve it as affordable housing. After the approval, the city and authority were planning to move forward in trying to save the mobile home park. The county and the city have each pledged $14.5 million to the effort. Less than a week after the decision, a federal judge also upheld the city’s requirement that if Buena Vista is closed, the owners must pay relocation costs of about $20,000 per resident. The city and county have been fighting to save Buena Vista because affordable housing is an endangered species in the region; in fact, Palo Alto’s 2015-2023 Housing Element states that there are almost no affordable housing options in the city for low-income households without substantial subsidies.
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“I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be." —
Martin Luther King, Jr.
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CWG Board Endorses Supervisors' Decisions
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The Community Working Group Board of Directors has officially endorsed the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors’ recent decisions to put Measure A, an affordable housing bond measure, on the November ballot, and to partner with Palo Alto and the County Housing Authority to save Buena Vista Mobile Home Park.
“As a dedicated group of volunteers who are committed to serving low-income families and individuals and strengthening our community through the creation of affordable homes, CWG commends our County Supervisors for their recent unanimous decisions in support of affordable housing,” said CWG Board Member Gail Price. “Their actions underscore the concern we all have, that so many hard-working people simply cannot find decent, affordable shelter in our region; and they are bold steps toward solving the problem.”
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Affordable Housing Issue Hits the Polls
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This November, Santa Clara County voters will consider Measure A, a $950 million bond measure to support affordable housing for people experiencing homelessness, low- and moderate-income residents, and first-time homebuyers.
Recent research indicates that voters are highly concerned about our region’s lack of affordable housing and its impact on individuals and the community as a whole. “For the first time in recent memory, voters see the most important problem facing Santa Clara County as housing,” said County Supervisor Cindy Chavez, who co-sponsored the bond proposal with Board President Dave Cortese. “We have nearly 5,000 people living on our streets and in our creeks, and the housing for them does not exist.”
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Santa Clara County currently has the fourth-highest homeless rate in the nation.
If Measure A passes, the majority of funds raised ($700 million) will
be allocated to support housing for extremely low-income residents (whose earnings fall below 30 percent of area median income), including permanent supportive housing, which targets chronically homeless individuals and helps them obtain health care and other services, and rapid rehousing projects, which are focused on those in temporary crisis. The measure must obtain a two-thirds majority vote to pass.
For more information about Measure A, visit
http://yesonaffordablehousing.org/
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“The golden way is to be friends with the world and to regard the whole human family as one." —
Mahatma Gandhi
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Celebration plans for the Opportunity Center’s 10th anniversary are underway! To make sure you are among the first to know what's coming up, please register for updates and put “OC10” in the “other contact instructions” field.
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“Each of us is a living system within a greater living system, connected to each other in more ways than we can fathom.”
— Paul H. Ray and Sherry Ruth Anderson
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Please forward this electronic issue of "Thresholds" to a friend and help us in our fight against homelessness by spreading the word about CWG's important work!
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Community Working Group | 650-299-8700 | cwg@communityworkinggroup.org www.communityworkinggroup.org
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