New Partners Join Push to End Generational Poverty in SF Public Housing

Kaiser, individual donors grant $4.4 million total; join large scale public-private effort to end generational poverty in San Francisco

(SAN FRANCISCO) — December 22, 2014 — Today, The San Francisco Foundation announced growing support for the Partnership for HOPE SF, a public private partnership led by The San Francisco Foundation, the City and County of San Francisco, and Enterprise Community Partners, that includes stakeholders from government, business, philanthropy, and community working together to end poverty and isolation for public housing residents.

Grants include $3 million from Kaiser Permanente, $1 million from an anonymous donor at The San Francisco Foundation, $250,000 from Hellman Foundation, $100,000 from Metta Fund, and $75,000 from California Healthcare Foundation. These grants follow national recognition the Partnership for HOPE SF received in October, winning the HUD/USDA 2014 Secretaries’ Award for Public-Philanthropic Partnerships. Kaiser’s $3 million grant is the largest financial support granted to date, supporting health strategies for HOPE SF, including the Peer Health Leadership Program, mental health and safety strategies – as well as a full scale evaluation of the programs.

“I applaud the Mayor for his vision and commitment to making sure that both communities and place are supported because they are equally important,” said Fred Blackwell, CEO of The San Francisco Foundation. “TSFF is part of a partnership that includes a host of local and national foundations, businesses, and individual donors committed to the vision of HOPE SF, and we welcome Kaiser to that group. I want to thank the residents of HOPE SF who have stuck with us, provided input and held our feet to the fire. We owe it to them to turn the tide on health disparities.”

“Kaiser Permanente has a long history of supporting organizations in our City that are critical to improving the health of our communities,” said Mayor Edwin M. Lee. “This grant will help San Francisco reach its goal of improving the quality of life for residents who may have challenges in getting the health care and support they need to lead healthy, productive lives and ultimately succeed in our City.”

HOPE SF focuses extensively on developing resident leaders as the change agents in their communities, supporting strategies that are designed and led by and for residents who engage their fellow community members. Developed and launched in 2013, The Peer Leadership Program was designed with community input after conducting community based research project in partnership with San Francisco State. The programs are managed by nonprofit organizations located at the four HOPE SF sites.

The Peer Health Leadership Program addresses pressing health and social issues facing 4,000 children and families in San Francisco’s HOPE SF public housing sites. Resident leaders, known as Peer Health Leaders, live in and are leaders within their communities. Programs like the Peer Health Leadership Program break down the socioeconomic barriers that families face, are rooted in the fortitude of the residents, and improve health and wellness of families.

Working hand-in-hand with residents, the Partnership for HOPE SF enhances human and social services. Creating much-needed flexible, fast-acting dollars, these catalytic funds allow TSFF and HOPE SF partners to focus on removing barriers to success so families can make ends meet. Drawing on the expertise of business, philanthropic, non-profit, academic and city leaders, the Partnership for HOPE SF focuses on San Francisco’s families who are living on the brink, to create opportunities for all city’s residents to enjoy the hallmarks of thriving communities: good schools, safe neighborhoods, and living-wage jobs.

“As part of the broader health eco-system, we fully understand the importance of collaborating with other organizations and supporting the programs and services they provide to make a deeper, more sustainable difference in the total health of our communities,” said Kaiser Permanente Chairman and CEO Bernard J. Tyson. “This grant demonstrates our commitment to creating communities that support the physical, emotional and spiritual well-being of those who live, work and thrive in San Francisco,”

“We’re proud to join this collective effort with the Mayor and The San Francisco Foundation, ensuring all residents in San Francisco live in thriving, healthy communities,” said Tricia Hellman Gibbs, President of the Hellman Foundation and founder and director of the San Francisco Free Clinic. “Peer leaders are the change agents of this work, creating successful programs to reduce health disparities like the walking school bus that brings kids to school each morning in a safe, supportive, and physically active way. We can and must do more, together, to promote opportunity and ensure that kids and families living in San Francisco’s public housing have the tools to set off toward a great future.”

Cities throughout the U.S. are looking to San Francisco for its progressive approach to partnering with philanthropists, community members, and government. Models that reshape policies and bring together public and private funding to unleash opportunity for parents who clock in and out every day so that they can spend time with their kids, and see them grow up healthy and with the tools and support they need to go to college and live a bright future.

“Continued investment by Kaiser, our foundation partners, and donors at The San Francisco Foundation is a great recognition of the fortitude of the residents of public housing, and the dedicated partnership between the public and philanthropic sectors to improve opportunities for families that have lived through years of disinvestment and neglect,” said Fred Blackwell, CEO of The San Francisco Foundation. “By banding together and investing in comprehensive strategies to address physical blight and human service needs, HOPE SF has shown that we accomplish far more in partnership than any one group, institution, or sector can accomplish on its own.”

“The HOPE SF initiative was conceived out of a sense of shared civic responsibility to our public housing residents,” said Mayor Ed Lee, City and County of San Francisco. “As we continue to rebuild public housing through the HOPE SF model and build a stronger community, we recognize that through philanthropic public-private partnerships, we can together create opportunities for families to succeed who have called San Francisco home for generations.”

HOPE SF focuses on four areas to achieve its ambitious results: 1) Improve social and economic outcomes for residents through innovative approaches to community building, eliminating barriers to employment, creating work readiness programs on site, and launching a peer leadership program improves health and wellness; 2) Create thriving, sustainable mixed-income neighborhoods, improving public safety, increasing open spaces and parks, school quality, access to health care, and neighborhood amenities; 3) Build quality housing and infrastructure with one-for-one public housing replacement units and homeownership opportunities; and 4) Generate and integrated systems approach to collectively gather data, to learn and adapt as necessary to promote and sustain opportunities for families to have a secure foundation on which to build a good life.

The partnership identifies, supports, and coordinates strategies focused on disrupting systemic poverty and improving economic opportunity, education, and health.

The City of San Francisco has leveraged the proven practices of the local HOPE SF communities by applying the place-based resident service approach to public housing services across the city. The innovative approach of HOPE SF is being shared and recognized nationally among federal programs (Housing and Urban Development Choice Neighborhoods Award), funders and networks (Living Cities Integration Initiative,) for its unique resident-centered approach to transforming lives as well as neighborhoods. As part of a national partnership, HOPE SF is building on the strength and expertise of many forward-thinking partners around the country – and they, in turn, are learning from HOPE SF.

For a full list of funding partners, visit sff.org/hopesf

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The San Francisco Foundation (SFF) is the community foundation serving the Bay Area since 1948, granting more than $808 million over the past ten years. Through the generosity and vision of our donors, both past and present, TSFF granted $86.8 million in fiscal year 2013. TSFF brings together donors and builds on community assets through grantmaking, leveraging, public policy, advocacy, and leadership development to make a greater impact in our community. By focusing on people, organizations, neighborhoods, and policy, advocacy and organizing, the Foundation addresses community needs in the areas of community health, education, arts and culture, community development, and the environment. In response to the economic downturn, TSFF is also focusing funding on safety net partners, job creation and training, and mortgage foreclosure relief and neighborhood preservation. The San Francisco Foundation serves San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, and San Mateo Counties. sff.org

Kaiser Permanente is committed to helping shape the future of health care. We are recognized as one of America’s leading health care providers and not-for-profit health plans. Founded in 1945, our mission is to provide high-quality, affordable health care services and to improve the health of our members and the communities we serve. We currently serve approximately 9.5 million members in eight states and the District of Columbia. Care for members and patients is focused on their total health and guided by their personal physicians, specialists and team of caregivers. Our expert and caring medical teams are empowered and supported by industry-leading technology advances and tools for health promotion, disease prevention, state-of-the-art care delivery and world-class chronic disease management. Kaiser Permanente is dedicated to care innovations, clinical research, health education and the support of community health. For more information, go to: kp.org/share.