Hamilton Families and their Strategic Partnerships team are finding the resources that families experiencing homelessness need to keep them on their feet, financially and emotionally.
Hamilton Families on Medium.com • Feb. 16, 2021 • By Devon Mandell
Although this dynamic and diverse group within Hamilton Families has only recently been active, the Strategic Partnerships team has made its mark and become a significant part of the Bay Area-based nonprofit.
Within a year, the team has set up over 15 partnerships including big names such as One Degree, partnering with them to use their online platform to create an internal resource referral tracking system for case workers supervising families experiencing homelessness. The team takes pride in their formal and working relationships, cultivating them like a gardener would their produce, and developing a range of partnerships from legal and financial, to health and workforce development assistance.
Ana Gomez — the Associate Director — and Harsimer Kahlon — the Program Manager — shed light on the responsibilities and internal aspects of the team and their work. Both are recent additions to the Hamilton Families’ tight knit organization.
“I started back in December of 2019,” Gomez shared, “I heard about this position in October 2019 through my colleague, Karely Ordaz. When I heard about the opportunity I was astonished and admired Hamilton Families’ work and mission.” Gomez recognized how fitting the job description was and knew with this role and this organization she would be able to grow personally as well. “I was born in Oakland, California and I saw the shift when more and more individuals and families became homeless and I felt as if I couldn’t do anything about it,” said Gomez.
As the Associate Director of Strategic Partnerships with a leading Bay Area homeless services agency serving families, she certainly is doing something about it now.
Kahlon is a social worker by training but having worked with nonprofit organizations in both India and the United States, she found her calling with Hamilton Families. “I started with Hamilton Families over a year ago in January 2020,” Kahlon shared,” I had recently moved to the Bay Area and was on a job hunt. I saw a post for the position I have now, and I was drawn to the work as I have always worked in the nonprofit world.” As the Program Manager, Kahlon takes the lead in operationalizing Hamilton Families’ partnerships. “My job is to take those partnerships and see how they can work with Hamilton Families,” said Kahlon, “I ask myself who needs to be where and how will this work?”
My job is to take those partnerships and see how they can work with Hamilton Families.
So, what does the Strategic Partnerships team really do? They support all the direct service, participant-facing programs within Hamilton Families, finding program staff the resources they need as families move to new communities. The team also aids in finding life skills training from budgeting and personal financial management, to job skills training, and medical and child well-being resources. They adapt the best practices to coach the participant-facing staff so staff can go out and coach the families they serve. “Without stable income, they cannot have stable housing,” Gomez said. They also recently hired a Workforce Development Coordinator to help coach families on tech literacy, helping them adjust to this virtual, work-from-home environment brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.
As it turns out, the Strategic Partnerships team was assembled at the beginning of 2020, right before the pandemic hit, creating immediate challenges to work around. “We became a full team in January 2020 and two months in the pandemic hit,” Gomez said, “the workflow was interrupted, and things changed drastically.”
We became a full team in January 2020 and two months in the pandemic hit.
The lack of physical gatherings and in-person workspaces greatly hindered the team’s processes. The Strategic Partnerships team had to act quickly, reaching out to partners including school meal providers and food banks, to see how to adapt. “The food banks were extremely overwhelmed,” Gomez said, “but they had immense resources and adapted to ‘drive-thrus’ and some even offered home deliveries, which we shared with our staff who could then share those with our participant families.”
Gomez shared how the team and Hamilton Families were changed drastically by the shift to remote work, but then the mental shift was how would this affect the participant families? “We had to step back and figure out how to help the families and their immediate needs,” Gomez said.
Through the help of external partners, Hamilton Families and the Strategic Partnerships team were able to continue aiding the families they serve in the Bay Area. Hamilton Families had received a grant from the USDA Farmers to Families program to give 25-pound produce boxes to all the families in their programs. With a quick call-to-action sent to their followers, the organization received around 10 volunteers every two weeks on a Friday to take the produce boxes to participants in their housing programs, even to cities as far out as Sacramento. “Handing these boxes to people who needed it, families who needed it, was helping re-humanize the work we do,” Gomez emphasized, “this has a generational impact.”
Kahlon remembered that moving everything remote all at once posed difficulties. “There are a couple ways we thought about it since on many levels for many people shifting the way we work was tricky,” said Kahlon. The team has watched how other organizations were and have been responding to the pandemic. Kahlon also noted how the Bay Area organizations have stepped up and tried immensely to remain offering services and resources. “Looking at how other organizations are going about this and getting in touch with them to see what our next steps are is a way we are working through this,” Kahlon said.
“We have had to be creative and empathic towards everyone,” emphasized Kahlon. Staying mindful and conscious of all decisions was an important part of the seismic shift the team went through. “Being able to be aware of how much the staff has had to adjust to all of this is something especially important to us,” Kahlon said, “and how we communicate with the participants.”
We have had to be creative and empathic towards everyone.
The awareness and empathy this diverse team exhibits coincides with the benefits of the partnerships and their programs. Gomez expressed that the biggest benefit is the opportunities these partnerships offer. “When I hear people reach out for support it makes me so happy because these small steps are big steps and even milestones for these participants,” Gomez said.
One of the partners the Strategic Partnerships team works with is JVS (Jewish Vocational Service), a San Francisco-based workforce development organization and they are mindful of the job market and needs of the area. JVS has health care training and city ambassadors with community outreach and community cleanings, all of which supply great resources to participants.
By partnering with organizations such as JVS, Hamilton Families is putting their name out in the greater Bay Area and gaining more recognition. “If we can make a geographical footprint of Hamilton Families, then when people move to other areas of the state and their landlord, food pantries, or other organizations know about us then they can help out even more,” Gomez said.
At the end of the day, it is about what is going to be most helpful and beneficial for families.
Kahlon noticed that one major benefit is that her team brings in programs that ultimately meet the needs of participant families where they are at, while trying to find resources for every step of the homelessness stability process that the participants experience. “At the end of the day, it is about what is going to be most helpful and beneficial for families,” Kahlon said, “What we want is to be able to make sure families are stabilized and make sure they have the resources when they exit.”
The Strategic Partnerships team holds a great deal of clout within Hamilton Families, especially for being the new kid on the block. Both Gomez and Kahlon emphasize how incredibly dynamic their team is, internally and externally. “Yes, we do a lot of work with external partners, but we have the ability to wow partners externally and find ways to make them work for our team, which is what makes us very dynamic,” Kahlon said.
It is also really important and impactful to have income and employment conversations with the participants as this can help them influence their housing decisions.
The team works with every program in Hamilton Families at every level, creating and implementing strategic plans for the participant families. “We are here to hear what is needed and we plan around that,” Gomez said, “It is also really important and impactful to have income and employment conversations with the participants as this can help them influence their housing decisions.” Being a source of coaching and guidance is significant for the participant families.
As for how this influential team is helping families who are experiencing homelessness, it is more of an indirect approach. They are not working directly with the participants, but they help define and support stable housing, a firm sense of community, as well as external opportunities and programs to keep those participants stabilized and on their feet.
Kahlon highlighted, “One of the things we did over the last 6 months was Ana worked really hard to bring in partners to present to the staff, and Smart Money Coaching was one of them.” Smart Money is a resource that supplies easy access to financial training and financial resources, which participant families can use whether they go through housing or stabilizing programs after being housed.
Collaborating with One Degree and revamping their referral tracking system was another project designed and launched by the Strategic Partnership team. “We want to elevate the lives of our participants and continue to improve our programs within Hamilton Families,” Gomez said.
The Strategic Partnership team is not letting any obstacle get in their way as they cultivate newer and larger partnerships, scaling their operations to bring in more resources to families experiencing homelessness in the San Francisco Bay Area.
For more information on Hamilton Families’ partnerships please visit hamiltonfamilies.org/partners.
If you or a family you know is in need of or wants to learn more about Hamilton Families’ suite of services, please visit hamiltonfamilies.org.