We've known for some time that a lack of transitional and emergency housing is a large stumbling block for many youth in our program and our community. Now it's time to do something about it.

Here is a note from our Executive Director and Founder, Jerri Howe, talking about how we're going to do that, and how you can help.

Greetings from the Matthews House,

Many of us are aware that we have youth in our community living in unsafe places. They have little or no family support. This tragedy was highlighted just last week when we were called to provide a safe place for an 18 year old girl who finally got the courage to leave an abusive situation with her stepfather. This young lady is too old for foster care and the abuse was not considered domestic violence. She has a 2 year old daughter so the only solution was for the 18 year old to go to a shelter and her daughter be placed in foster care. So not to bring more trauma to the situation by separating mom and child, we were able to provide temporary shelter through a host home until other arrangements were made.

Because we have seen an increase in homeless youth and youth lacking caring adults, we have decided to reach out to the community to build our Host Home program. We have engaged a part time director who has years of experience in community based alternative housing options for youth. We will be holding two information sessions. If you have an interest or know of someone who might, please plan to attend or pass along this information to others. As we have experienced in the past, when awareness for unmet needs is raised in our community caring individuals always step forward to help. Thank you for your consideration of attending or passing along information about these information sessions.

Joy to your day,

Jerri

A Matthews House Host Home provides transitional and emergency housing for youth. Stays may range from one week to 6 months.  As a Matthews House Host Parent, you will be trained and supported to take a young adult into your home and help prepare them for transition on their own.

Please join us for an Open House to learn more about becoming a Host Family.
Wednesday, February 3, 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
or
Thursday, February 4, 7:30 a.m. to 8:30 a.m.

Please RSVP today: Gkoenig@thematthewshouse.org
or call Gwen at #970.217.7273 or sign up here.

Local Nonprofits are working together to raise awareness during Mentor Month.

The Larimer County Mentoring Coalition is celebrating January as National Mentor Month. Mentor Month is a national campaign, first introduced in 2002, which is spearheaded by the Harvard Mentoring Project, MENTOR, and the Corporation for National and Community Service and focuses attention on the positive impact mentoring can have on young lives and the need for mentors in our communities. This campaign helps identify how each of us—individuals, businesses, government agencies, schools, faith communities, and nonprofits—can work together to increase the number of mentors and assure brighter futures for our young people. “At any given time there are hundreds kids on mentoring waiting lists in Larimer County. Some of these kids get very discouraged, waiting years for a match.” said Kathleen Vasa, Volunteer Program Coordinator, Volunteers of America Northern Colorado Services.

"Thank Your Mentor Day" is January 22, 2009, which many mentoring programs select as a day of recognition for their volunteers and for Mentor Month. We encourage you to think of the mentors in your life—a team coach, teacher, concerned neighbor, or another caring adult—and take a few minutes to thank them and then consider becoming a mentor yourself. The Larimer County Mentoring Coalition consists of multiple mentoring organizations committed to raising awareness of the need for mentors, and to recruiting and retaining high quality mentors for children and young adults in Larimer County. Mentoring opportunities range in time commitment and availability to ensure there is an opportunity to fit any lifestyle.

Larimer County Mentoring Coalition members are Volunteers of America Northern Colorado Services, Boys and Girls Clubs of Larimer County, The Matthews House, Partners Mentoring Youth of Larimer County, Turning Point Center for Youth and Family Development, Larimer Center for Mental Health, and Larimer County Human Services, Children, Youth and Family Division.

“It’s our goal to become a one-stop-shop for all who are interested in becoming a mentor in Larimer County.” said Vasa, “Individuals who are interested can call 970-472-9630 for more information about mentoring and the mentoring opportunities in Larimer County.”

Written by

Kathleen Vasa, Volunteer Program Coordinator,

Volunteers of America Northern Colorado Services
(970) 472-9630
voarsvp@frii.com

If you are interested in mentoring or volunteering at the Matthews House, we'd love to have you. Please contact Steve

Yesterday's Coloradoan included the picture above and the article below.

The photo: CSU professor Ken Smith, center, poses with CSU culinary students who served a Thanksgiving meal at The Matthews House.

After just 4 years, we’ve seen some major life changes and we now have youth who've successfully completed our program who are coming back and wanting to help others coming from similar situations. We have seen great results in our program and it is great to have the community agencies and media recognize our success as well.

The article:

Agencies display proven record of aid

BY SARA B. HANSEN
SaraHansen@coloradoan.com

Pathways Past Poverty provided money to prominent agencies in 2009 in an effort to showcase best practices for helping move people from poverty to self-sufficiency.

Pathways Past Poverty, an initiative of the United Way of Larimer County, provided $35,000 for The Matthews House and $50,000 to Project Self-Sufficiency.

Both agencies have a proven record of helping people become self-sufficient, said Marija Weeden-Osborn, Pathways Past Poverty coordinator and community investment associate.

The goal is to help them expand their reach, Weeden-Osborn said."When we look at this thing, we can show that we can move more people than Matthews House or Project Self-Sufficiency on their own," she said.

Matthews House serves 16- to 21-year-old residents who are aging out of the foster-care system and youths on parole who have virtually no family.

Project Self-Sufficiency helps low-income, single parents achieve economic independence by assisting with education, housing, child care, transportation, employment and health.

Matthews House first assesses the physical and mental-health needs, housing needs, employment experience, education and life skills of its clients, said Jerri Howe, executive director. Then it works to create a program for participants and meets weekly with them to discuss their goals.

"We're not what I call a flop house," Howe said. "Don't just come expecting handouts." The goal is to get the children to see they have a future outside of survival mode, Howe said. And Matthews House does that by getting its clients to help create an independent living plan. The agency helps with finding housing, internships, apprenticeships and jobs.

Matthews House has the staff to work with 65 to 70 people at a time and tries to keep a balance of 16 to 20 participants for each staff member so they can build relationships, Howe said, and really work to help the clients develop solutions.

The agency also relies on volunteers. "We have art teachers, music teachers, sewing instructors and more come to Matthews House to volunteer," Howe said. "The youths see these community members donating time, and they see that sense of community. It means so much for them to see that people care for you even if they aren't being paid to care for you." …

(complete article here)

Throughout the month of January, Rodizio Grill in Fort Collins will be spreading the word about and raising funds for the Matthews House.

Every guest at Rodizio this month will have the opportunity to make a donation to the Matthews House and receive an equivalent amount in "Rodizio bucks".

So here's what that looks like,

1. You enjoy a delicious dinner at Rodizio Grill.

2. When you pay your bill, you donate $20 to the Matthews House.

3. You receive $20 toward your next delicious dinner at Rodizio.

That's like making a donation, without giving away any money.

I already know they've got some pretty tasty food, so this sounds like an amazingly good deal to me.

If you haven't been to Rodizio yet, now is the time.

If you have, it's a great time to come back to the table and bring some friends.

I was standing in our basement the other day handing a box of food to a parole officer who was taking the food to one of the families she works with. Now, you might expect that I was thinking about how horrible it is that we have families in our community who worry about where their next meal is coming from, and I was, but the overwhelming feeling I was experiencing was, “I love Christmas!”

We have great needs in our community all year long and there are amazing gifts of generosity that happen every day.

However, at Christmas we get to see the generous spirit that I believe inhabits every one of us humans overflow. This season shows me what is possible, what we as individuals and particularly as a community are capable of. 

I am feeling deep gratitude to all those people who are inspiring me and encouraging us this Christmas at the Matthews House. Here are a few…

• Colorado Carriage and Wagon gave 15 of our girls an evening carriage ride, probably not an experience they would ever have had.
• Whole Foods Market, through the generosity of thousands of their customers donated $4,000 of food to the Matthews House, so much that we have been able to not only meet the needs of our youth, but share with other agencies and families we are connected to.
• The Shepherd of the Hills Quilting Group delivered 7 beautiful handmade few full-size quilts that we’ve passed on to youth in our program. They LOVE them!
• A book club that made food and hung out with the youth at our Christmas Party.
• Several volunteers who decided we needed holiday decorations in every room and then handmade and hung them.
• Crossroads Church who held a toy drive and provided toys for several of our youth who have little ones of their own.
• Dozens of people who provided gift cards so our youth could all receive a Christmas present, and
• Burn Longboards, a local company who put on an entire evening event to benefit the Matthews House.

This just scratches the surface of all the people and things we are thankful for this Christmas season. Yes, there are always more needs, more heartbreaking stories, but there are also incredible stories of hope and generosity – and that is what this season is about.

We are so encouraged by the compassion and support of our community.

THANK YOU ALL!!!

On Friday night, Dec. 11, Burn Longboards, a new Fort Collins-based company, held an event called Carve for a Cause to benefit the Matthews House.

The event featured longboards crafted by Burn and painted by local artists, Taylor Gallegos, Scotty Roebuck, Dustin Groeneman and Elle Martinez. These boards were auctioned off while guests enjoyed good company, beer donated by Odell Brewing and appetizers from Cafe Vino.

We are thrilled to be the beneficiary of this well-organized and successful event which raised over $1,500 for the Matthews House!

Not only did we raise a significant amount of money for our program, but we also made great connections with community members who will get involved as mentors and in other support and advocacy roles.

This was a great partnership and we thank Burn Longboards owner Moses Horner and intern Katie Powell for the opportunity to be involved and for all the hard work they put into making this event a classy and tremendously successful event.

On December 2nd our Girl’s Group had a chance to celebrate the Christmas season in style.

Even though it was a frigid evening, we had 15 young women come out to start off the evening with a horsedrawn carriage ride around Old Town. The ride ended up at Canino’s Italian Restaurant, where the group was treated to a 3-course spaghetti dinner, complete with gelato for a perfect finish.

This was a special way to end the year for our Girl's Group. This monthly group is an important time for our girls to be able to get together, build relationships, and broaden their horizons with new experiences.

Thanks so much to Colorado Carriage and Wagon and Canino’s Italian Restaurant for making this special evening possible!

Last Wednesday, we got together for our November Family Dinner, also known as our Thanksgiving Feast.

Once a month, we host a dinner for youth in our program and their guests. This is a time to just come to the house and have a tasty family style meal prepared by wonderful volunteers in a comfortable space. Each of our youth can bring along family, friends, a mentor – whoever they would like to spend the evening with. Sometimes after dinner there's a card game, charades, or an outdoor activity, sometimes just hanging out and talking.

This month, in honor of Thanksgiving, Ken Smith, one of our Board members and a professor in CSU's Restaurant and Resort Management program, organized a group of his students to prepare a traditional Thanksgiving meal of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, veggies and topped off with delicious pie.

About 50 youth, staff, volunteers, family and mentors descended on the house for a festive evening of giving thanks!

If you've been shopping at Whole Foods in Fort Collins recently there's a good chance you've been asked if you would like to add a donation to your grocery bill in order to help people in need in our community this holiday season. If you've said yes, we'd like to say "Thank You!"

This is part of Whole Foods Market’s annual Grab and Give campaign. As a recipient organization, the Matthews House received $4,000 in healthy groceries last Wednesday morning. To help you imagine how much food that it, it took us 3-pick-up truck loads! This food will go to our youth and their families over the holidays and into the new year, helping them to plan and prepare healthy meals.

We are so thankful to the Fort Collins community for their generosity, to Whole Foods for running this campaign and for allowing us to be a recipient of this generosity from our community!