MAKING A DIFFERENCE WHERE IT MATTERS
The challenges of poverty in LA County are deeply rooted and large-scale. At Specialty Family Foundation, we concentrate our philanthropic investments on core areas that address pressing challenges in underserved communities, provide clear pathways out of poverty, and offer significant potential for progress: Catholic education, housing, and substance use treatment and intervention.
CATHOLIC EDUCATION
Reimaging Our Communities’ Catholic Schools
Our commitment to inner-city Catholic education is founded on the belief that these schools can be powerful assets of poverty alleviation. Nevertheless, decades of enrollment and budget challenges make an undeniable case that the “model” or “paradigm” that has worked so well for at risk students for more than a century in Los Angeles must be adjusted to remain the relevant, solvent, impactful, and life-altering instruments of social good they seek to be. After a decade of seeking this type of change at the individual school level, SFF is now investing in systemic paradigm adjustments that, if effective, will set up all low-income-serving Catholic schools in the region for greater success, growth, and vitality for theses populations that depend on them as a powerful neighborhood option in the educational landscape. SFF is grateful for the vision and hopeful audacity of its primary systemic partners in Catholic education. SFF supports bold leaders who see the space of Catholic education through a similar lens and have plans to take significant steps in how Catholic schools are governed, financed, staffed and diversified in their programmatic offerings.
- Archdiocese of Los Angeles Department of Catholic Schools
- Loyola Marymount University
- Catholic School Collaborative
- Partners for Children South Los Angeles
- FADICA
- National Catholic Education Foundation
INVESTMENTS IN ACTION
1.855
Million Invested
over 3 Years
270
Schools Reached
INVESTMENTS IN ACTION
480
Investment over
Three Years
760
Students Reached
7
Elementary Schools Participating
“This is an amazing partnership that has allowed us to provide our teachers and students opportunities to collectively grow and engage as lifelong learners. We are transforming the learning experience for our students and closing the achievement and opportunity gap for the community we serve.”
HOUSING
Opening Doors to the Most Vulnerable
We believe that housing is a human right. A stable, safe home is essential in supporting healthy family structures, and in providing for the whole child — with space to thrive academically, emotionally, and physically. With a home to call their own, families have the opportunity to break free of conditions that contribute to persistent poverty.
Every day, a growing number of people and families live in their cars or on the streets. In response to this reality, in 2020 Specialty Family Foundation incorporated Housing as a new focus area of philanthropic investment. Over the next five years, we intend to invest $5,000,000 with the ultimate goal of getting people off the streets and into affordable, safe, and stable homes.
As part of this effort, Specialty Family Foundation invests in organizations and programs that focus on housing preservation and homelessness prevention for LA County’s most vulnerable children, foster care youth, transitional age youth, and families. We additionally seek solution providers who offer complete wrap-around services that address substance use disorder, mental illness, and unemployment. Our investments will work to support targeted, innovative strategies aimed at:
- Establishing best practices and policies in housing
- Identifying areas with the highest level of impact
- Creating lasting, systemic change
- Expanding organizational capacity
- Focusing on prevention as well as intervention
HOMELESSNESS IN LA COUNTY — 2019-2020*
66433
UNSHELTERED
INDIVIDUALS
12.7
INCREASE IN UNSHELTERED PEOPLE
19
INCREASE IN UNSHELTERED TRANSITION-AGE YOUTH
45.7
INCREASE IN UNSHELTERED FAMILIES
32
UNSHELTERED PEOPLE EXPERIENCE SUBSTANCE USE DISORDERS
*Greater Los Angeles Homeless County 2020. Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority
“The journey out of poverty and ending the cycle of drug addiction, mental illness, unemployment, and ultimately the housing crisis, begins with each person having a roof over their head.”
SUBSTANCE USE TREATMENT
&
INTERVENTION
When Families Recover, So Do Communities
Substance use disorder is one of the most complex and intractable contributors to persistent poverty. In one year alone, over 50,000 people in LA County were treated for substance use. *Many of those who struggle with addiction confront other interconnected challenges, including homelessness and mental illness. To break the cycle of addiction and poverty, we must invest in novel approaches to substance use intervention, prevention, and treatment for the whole family. Because where there is recovery, there is also healing and hope.
Specialty Family Foundation recognizes the role substance use plays in intergenerational poverty, incarceration, and homelessness. To meet this interconnected challenge, substance use treatment and intervention is one of our key focus areas for future investments.
Innovative Approach to Early Intervention
Our annual $100,000 investment in SHIELDS’ Heros & Sheros Youth Development Program helps children of parents stabilize their homes and break the cycle of addiction.
Learn More
MEETING THE CHALLENGE
Of the 50,252 people in LA County admitted for substance use treatment:
45
WERE LATINX
29
HAD IMMIGRANT PARENTS
24.52
WERE AGES 16-25
37
DID NOT COMPLETE HIGH SCHOOL*
“Addiction is a family disease and we should be moving forward a generation of children that never ever have to experience substance abuse in their lives. By providing family centered treatment, we can make that happen.”