Hello everyone! My name is Grant Sippel and I am going to be a junior at the University of Portland earning a degree in Organizational Communications with a Spanish minor. I was born and raised in Carlsbad, CA, a beach town right on the coast of California about 40 minutes north of downtown San Diego.
If you take a drive from one end of Carlsbad to the other, it will take you about 30 minutes. During those 30 minutes, you will rarely find any individuals on the streets affected by homelessness. As a child, my dad lived in Oceanside, which is about 10 minutes north of Carlsbad and has a higher population of homeless individuals. Here I would see many folks on the streets and asking for money at intersections, and out of my ignorance I associated Carlsbad as a place that was shielded from this issue. Basically, I grew up in a bubble. When I decided to select UP as my place of education, I knew the change in scenery was going to require a major adjustment on my part.
The reason why I included details about my upbringing and interaction with homelessness is because this summer I have been assisting and working with an organization that strives to end homelessness PERMANENTLY. Solutions For Change is a non-profit organization in Vista, CA that wants to eliminate the “band-aid” approach from our society. Shelters and services for these individuals have them wait in line to give them a meal for a night, a roof over their head for a night, and a bed for a night; it’s all temporary. The very next day they wait in line and may not get any of that. Then what?
The reason that Solutions for Change exists, our vision, is to deliver a permanent, sustainable and replicable community-driven solution to deep poverty. Then, we share it everywhere. We offer a 1,000 day transformation program where residents take part in 3 Initiatives of our organization.
- Solutions University (SU) – Our residents spend 500 days “on-campus” at our Solutions University housing where they attend coaching and servant leadership classes, gain knowledge and resources making significant life changes, and work at our main office and social enterprise. Children are in provided childcare during the day while the parents attend classes and work. After the day is completed, they live together along with other families in a dorm-like set-up with supervision by Case Managers.
- Solutions Farms/Enterprise (SF) – Solutions Farms is SFC’s Social Enterprise where residents of the program work during the day for the first part of the program. Solutions Farms is the largest Aquaponics farm in the western United States, growing lettuce and fish together (side note: growing fish and plants separately creates a lot of waste, and combining these two products actually benefits one another their growth and resources). The plants and fish grown are then sold to local markets which bring in revenue for our program – it’s killing two birds with one stone. This work experience teaches responsibility, teamwork, and diligence to stay motivated in the program.
- Solutions in the Community (SC) – Once our residents commence to the second 500-day period, they are now “off-campus”. Solutions For Change owns and runs off-campus housing developments where our residents live with their families. They are still part of the program even at a distance, and must pass drug tests and maintain work and provide income for their families.
This approach we have as a society, by giving out a dollar or 50 cents to someone on the side of the road, makes us feel good. But it doesn’t help those receiving our tiny donation ESCAPE their homelessness. It may get them a half-decent meal for a night, but the true issue is the “churn”. As described by our CEO Chris Megison, the “churn” is the the costly and futile cycle that occurs when the root causes of family homelessness are not addressed, causing homelessness to REPEAT. They may get resources and services for a month at a shelter upon acceptance, but after that their time is up and they need to find a new solution and a new place to stay. Many children and families never escape the churn, and these children grow up in a lifestyle of hardship, and equally the parents are hurting because of the hardships their families are facing. Other shelters help with the immediate issues of homelessness, such as offering beds or meals, but they don’t rescue these individuals.
If homelessness is like a bullet wound, the temporary services only stop the bleeding. After a while, you need to replace those bandages and treat them for the pain. However, there won’t be any healing until you get that bullet out. So, surgery is required. Our program is like surgery for these individuals – getting deep down into the roots of their suffering and diagnosing, treating, and curing it. Since we are a 1,000 day program, it’s daunting for someone facing addiction, abuse, or homelessness to put the time and effort in making the change. However, with the perseverance and support our case managers and staff provide to our residents taking that first step, they make it out of those 1,000 days with a complete transformation. Solutions does not only require our residents to show up and pass attendance; we require our residents to show up and WANT to change. I’ve learned that those suffering from homelessness, abuse, addiction, incarceration, whatever it may be, can make a significant change in their lives with only so much help from others. Ultimately, they need to be the ones to want to make that change happen for themselves and their families and see it through.
As an member of this organization, I’ve had the opportunity to attend servant leadership classes with our residents where we examine the difference between servant leadership and co-dependency. To outline it briefly, it’s the difference in assistance in either a healthy or an unhealthy way. Co-dependency is the act of serving others in an unhealthy manner. The root causes of co-dependency include fear, guilt, shame, lack of self esteem, etc. For example, a loved one may experience a strong fear that their significant other may leave them, so they act to ensure they stay with them. Servant leadership is the act of serving others in a healthy way – if we look at the previous example, it could be communicating that fear, sitting down and discussing what you need and want to see in the relationship, etc. With these points, many of our residents struggle with co-dependency issues which contributed to their unhealthy lifestyles. Many residents were in unhealthy relationships involving money or abuse. Some had family members unintentionally contributing to their addiction by housing them and enabling it to continue, which could have been initiated out of guilt that they fell into their addiction because of the parents’ actions. No matter the contribution, servant leadership can be the antidote for co-dependency. It can redefine how you need to serve others, how to approach it, how to set boundaries, and how to allow yourself to stay involved in a healthy, appropriate, and useful way.
With another half of the summer left, there will be much more to learn about this issue across the world. Solutions For Change believes they have the key to curing the nation’s homelessness issue one step at a time, one family at a time. I’m proud to be working with them and learning about their system and their mission. With their motives and goals, we can all #solutionizers!