It’s almost 8 p.m., the dinner plates have been cleared, and Alisha, 32, is tired. Across the room at Lafayette’s Temple Isaiah, near the reading corner, toddlers squeal as they play with teenage volunteers, surrounded by Hula Hoops, blocks, dolls and Legos.
Alisha’s 13-year-old son runs up, wide-eyed. “Mom, they have a karaoke system!” She nods. “That’s good, you can do that,” she says, and off he goes.
He has hard days, but his mom thinks he’s doing pretty well, considering the situation. Alisha was laid off from her human resources job in August and soon after became unable to pay rent. This will be her family’s first Christmas in a homeless shelter.
Alisha and her son are among the estimated 4,000 people in Contra Costa County who are homeless on any given night. From Dec. 19 to Jan. 2, they’ll also be among the 30 to 40 people calling Temple Isaiah home, as part of the Winter Nights family shelter program.
A project of the Interfaith Council of Contra Costa County, the program is now in its eighth year. It is run almost entirely by volunteers, including about two dozen churches, synagogues and other faith organizations that participate for one to two weeks on a rotating basis from October through April. Winter Nights provides housing, meals, job training, child care and other services to homeless families and seniors, with the ambitious goal of helping them transition into permanent housing and stable employment by the program’s end.
Last year, with a budget of $135,000 — one-third from foundations, the rest from individuals and congregations — Winter Nights helped feed, shelter and support 108 people, most of them children. In the current economic climate, such basic assistance has become crucial to an even greater number of families.
“The needs are growing and changing,” says Rebecca Calahan Klein, a lead program coordinator at Isaiah. “When most people think of the common causes of homelessness, they think of drug abuse, alcoholism, mental illness. And those things do contribute. … But with the way the last few years have been economically, we’re mostly seeing people who have become homeless because of losing a job, or there’s an illness or injury that prevents one of the breadwinners from working, and they can’t afford health care.
“When you see the kind of ordinary families participating in Winter Nights, you realize you have to check those assumptions at the door,” she says.
For the duration of the program, the visitors are sleeping in the synagogue’s auditorium, eating three meals a day provided by the kitchen, attending job-skills trainings and other classes, and spending recreational time with Temple Isaiah’s ample team of volunteers — some 500 people each year. One to two dozen volunteers, from kids to seniors, are present at the shelter on any given night.
The clients gathering around tables to socialize after the meal tonight are black, white and Latino. They are young and old, though organizers say there’s a high percentage of very young children this year.
Though accurate statistics on homeless youth are hard to come by, one report by the National Center on Family Homelessness suggests at least 1.6 million children are homeless in the U.S. — a 38 percent spike from 2007.
At Temple Isaiah — whose congregants regularly sign up to cover the two weeks including Christmas, when churches are overwhelmed with holiday planning — volunteers turn out in droves every year to ensure that the synagogue feels as much as possible like home.
The little things matter. In the main room, a tent for each family provides a precious bit of privacy. On a folding table, welcome bags contain necessities such as toothpaste, sunblock, hairbrushes and reusable water bottles. A wardrobe is packed with donated winter coats, dresses and business clothes.
Each day’s schedule, posted on the wall, is filled with workshops and outings: trips to register for library cards, visits with social workers and research on housing assistance, a day at the Oakland Zoo, horseback riding at a local ranch and more. One 19-year-old mother was especially looking forward to a planned salon visit — the owner of Tice Valley Salon in Walnut Creek donated her time to pamper female clients. Special celebrations are planned for Christmas and New Year’s Eve.
The teen center, in a sectioned-off area, contains couches, a foosball table, air hockey — and a chance for teens and their parents to get a much-needed break from each other.
“I think the teens might have it the hardest,” says Gwen Watson, a founder of Winter Nights. She gestures at a small child playing with a toy car. “See, she thinks she’s at a sleepover. But the teens? The teens know exactly what’s going on, and they know the stigma. That’s a lot of weight to bear for their families.”
Volunteer Zak Abeles, 13, among the kids playing air hockey, is responsible for the wall decorations in the teen area — as well as for many of the gifts the young clients will be receiving from Santa (Temple Isaiah’s custodian) on Christmas Day. Abeles, who had his bar mitzvah a week ago, decided early on that his project would be Winter Nights.
“On my way home from school in Berkeley, I see homeless people every day,” Abeles says. “And I realized it wasn’t just adults, there were kids my age who were homeless, too.” Abeles enlisted his parents’ help to ask for Christmas lists from the families participating in Winter Nights, then raised funds to buy gifts.
In the kitchen, meanwhile, volunteers produce healthy, comforting meals. Tina Goodfriend, evening meal coordinator, plans the menus with Klein, who has seen to it that the meals reflect the community’s commitment to all things local, organic and sustainable. Dinner tonight is macaroni and cheese, steamed broccoli, garlic bread, salad and fruit, with warm apple crisp and ice cream for dessert.
“We want this concept of nourishing your mind, body and spirit, in a way that respects the Earth,” says Klein.
Before dinner, the volunteers and clients gather in a circle, while Klein says a brief word of welcome and recites the HaMotzi. Then everyone sits down to eat together.
“It’s just putting tikkun olam into practice,” says Jeffrey Goodfriend, Tina’s husband and an activity coordinator. “Homelessness is kind of a concept, right? This is putting a face on it. This is making it real.”
For Erin Bloom, a writing coach and former teacher, the desire to help every year stems partially from her work as an educator. “We know that homelessness can wreak complete havoc on a student’s progress, and there are homeless kids and teens who are completely under the radar, often not getting the help they need, right here in Lafayette,” she says.
“If they have to care for their younger siblings, if they’re not getting enough sleep or proper nutrition, these things affect how they’re doing in school. And if their parents are trying to find work or figuring out the next place to sleep, chances are they’re not available for homework help.”
Providing tutoring, educational games and activities is a mainstay of the program, says Klein. “It’s a simple thing that really helps, and when you see some of the connections you form with these kids … that’s what it’s all about, that we’re all connected to each other.”
As the first evening at the synagogue draws to a close, Klein calls everyone together for a last word before families retreat to their tents. Tonight, she wants to talk about Abraham’s journey, and how each person at Temple Isaiah tonight is on a journey of his or her own.
Alisha, for one, says she has no trouble looking ahead. Though the program will provide housing to some families through April, “I have some leads already,” she says. “I’m looking at jobs, looking at apartments. It’s not where I thought I’d be right now, that’s for sure, and it takes a lot of patience. But I do try to look at it as an experience.
“Like I tell my son, you take it one day at a time. You say ‘OK, let’s see what’s going to happen next.’ ”