Generations of Hope Growing in the Springtime
It is fascinating to find out how people and organizations interested in developing a new Generations of Hope community heard about the concept. In many cases exploring the internet of key words brings them to the website. In others, it is multiple news stories that appear about the positive impact we are having on challenging issues of the 21st century. Books, magazines, NPR and friends that live in existing communities all help spread the idea to others. Since the last newsletter issue the following have moved from the response to having a series of technical conversations and seeking advice. Here are some of the newest:
Greater St. Petersburg Florida area
Clemson, South Carolina Area
Columbus, Ohio new direction multi story “community”
Boise, Idaho
Janetville, Ontario, Canada
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Jacksonville, North Carolina
Around the Horn (Maybe the Cape of Good Hope) Existing Sites
When you have a moment visit the new Bridge Meadows website. A new fresh design. Among other things, it shows the expanding footprint of the “Bridge Team.†To me, the best part of the new site is their reaching out to help others grow the “movement.†They join Tree House Foundations in urging others to expand the concept of intentional intergenerational communities in new cities.
Like Bridge Meadows, Treehouse Foundation has created a new website design. Of interest is the offer of a personal hour tour. As Treehouse works to expand sites it is becoming famous for its œrevisioning foster care approaches to communities and programming.
Dylan Tate, executive for Bastion is about a month away from the completion of construction of phase 1 of Bastion community in New Orleans for Wounded Warriors, their families and Seniors.
Boise, Idaho is the home of a dynamic, hard charging Patti Williams. Over the last few months she has approached multiple key stakeholders in the Boise area, interchanging on the concepts of a Generations of Hope community in the Boise region. Patti is an enthusiastic person delivering an exciting message to a host of community thinkers and leaders. So far lots of very interested partners are coming forward to help.
Two Conferences of Interest
2017 Cohousing Association’s Cohousing Conference May 19-21 in Nashville, TN
The national conference of the Cohousing Association will be the first conference this year. Our effort will be to become more knowledgeable in Co-Housing and to share with the participants the Generations of Hope concept. Last year, a trip to the Grounded Solutions national conference to learn about Community Land Trusts(CLT) was a major success. Not only is the CLT a viable option for many of our newer sites, but a contact list of over 100 people dedicated to the world of rural and urban permanent affordable housing now know about the Generations of Hope concept (I hope!). The co-housing national conference in Nashville in May will be another chance to learn about a viable intentional intergenerational option. And of course it will be a 3 day opportunity to tell people interested in about the Generations of Hope movement. I will be joined by Mary Kay Walton director of the Sweetgrass Community (rumor has it a name change is imminent) and Jane Tuls director of Community of Hope in Fremont Michigan.(home of Gerber baby food)
Generations United International Intergenerational Conference Milwaukee June 13-16 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (https://guconference.org/)
This is the 19th annual conference sponsored by Generations United, an important friend of Generations of Hope. Dr. Brenda Eheart founder of Generations of Hope will be on one panel, Renee Moseley, Associate Director of Bridge Meadows will be on another panel. I will share with the attendees the emerging concept of double social utility in a session late in the conference. We will share with the conference, snapshots of all the sites actively working on new communities. It should overwhelm them!
Bringing in the Experts to Help You! The Top 50 Affordable Housing Developers of 2016
The Affordable Housing Finance E-Newsletter sent out an interesting list of the 50 most active Housing Developers in the world of affordable housing. (http://www.housingfinance.com/management-operations/top-50-affordable-housing-developers-of-2016). If you explore the list for developers near your area, setting up a meeting or two with them might give you a new important contact for your project. Their abilities -if they become part of your team- could greatly shorten the time of getting your project off the ground and in operations. Many of these organizations have projects in multiple states and construct and manage market based projects. In the near future, we will be sending out general information to a select number of these superstars in the affordable housing world, to build a level of interest in the Generations of Hope concept.
Trends in Funding – Better Serving Foster Youth in the Foster Care System
Did you know that Foster Youth through the age of 22 years can continue to receive funding beyond the age of 18 years if they participate in growth activities?
Research into the outcomes of state and county child welfare programs that care for foster children have consistently shown very poor outcomes when these youth are followed into their twenties. (Dr. Mark Courtney at the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration has carried out some of the landmark research on this population.) As part of efforts to improve outcomes, Federal legislation passed nearly ten years ago and more recent Federal legislation focusing on Human Trafficking provide both “Carrots and Sticks†to assist states in improving programming for older foster youth. For example,
Passage of the federal Fostering Connections to Success Act of 2008 (FCA) now provides states with the option to continue providing Title IV-E reimbursable foster care, adoption, or guardianship assistance payments to children up to the age of 19, 20 or 21 if the youth is:
- Employed for at least 80 hours per month.
- Participating in a program or activity designed to promote, or remove barriers to, employment.
- Enrolled in an institution that provides post-secondary or vocational education.
- Completing secondary education or a program leading to an equivalent credential.
- Incapable of doing any of the above because of a medical condition.
The Newer federal legislation, Preventing Sex Trafficking and Strengthening Families Act of 2014, now requires state child welfare agencies to avoid “dumping†older foster youth in “permanent plans†basically placing youth in independent settings without programming.
- Prohibited from using “Another Planned Permanent Living Arrangement (APPLA) as a permanency goal.”
- Develop a reasonable and prudent parenting standard for foster parents to make parental decisions to maintain the health and safety of foster youth, and also make decisions about the youth’s participation in extracurricular, enrichment, cultural and social activities.
- Ensure that children in foster care age 14 or older participate in the development of, or revision to, his or her case plan, which must describe the foster child’s rights.
- Provide children aging out of foster care with a birth certificate, a Social Security card, health insurance information, medical records and a driver’s license or state identification.
Currently 22 states have passed legislation permitting funding of foster youth up to the age of 22 years. Several states provide even more programming to assure better outcomes for foster children beyond the Federal programs. (Of note: Esther and Jan Stearns exploring a Generations of Hope inspired site in San Francisco have in addition to this effort, provided substantial resources for a foster youth scholarships and programs at Cal State University San Marcos.)
Over the last year or so Generations of Hope has encouraged multiple new sites to create an intergenerational community taking advantage of this programming and other programming unique to a state that will improved outcomes for this population. We believe that a number more sites can be developed around the country.
President’s Notes
Let me introduce you to the new term, Double Social Utility. Its not a new tagline but one that made a brief appearance during Welfare Reform back in the Reagan era. A quick definition is “one dependent group supporting another group for the common interest of each other.†The Generations of Hope concept is more and more defined as seniors helping a vulnerable population and as the seniors get older or would be prone to the negative consequences of isolation, members of the vulnerable population and their families sharing in their abilities and social interactions with the seniors. In Generations of Hope material you will see this “new†concept used to describe what we are trying to do.