Dear friends of Solutions for Change,
If you’ve been around Solutions for Change, then chances are you’ve been a part of many stories of overcoming. Did you know that the very first of those stories occurred twenty-one years ago, when Tammy and I were fired, after we refused to convert the work-to-eat homeless recovery programs we had built into a government funded and controlled program? We were surprised, but not as surprised as when those who knew and trusted us; the Vista mayor and many CEO’s and pastors made it so that this wouldn’t be the end of our story. Those community leaders rallied around a vision and dedicated themselves to a new story that would become known as Solutions for Change, and within a few months it was so. The very birth of Solutions happened from loss and conflict, and ultimately from the spirit of overcoming.
A few months later, on a very cold February night in 2000, our founding story was crafted. Jessica, a nine-year-old homeless shelter girl leapt into our hearts when she pulled on my sleeve, and with the sweet innocent question, “Hey Mister, do you live here too?” our little nonprofit turned into a movement. Jessica had no idea that with those simple words, Solutions for Change would transform from a simple name into a promise to her and thousands more homeless kids. Over the past twenty years, the stories of families overcoming immense personal hardships, and the story of all of you who would support and underwrite those futures, kept coming. Perhaps the most transformational of those stories would come from two teenage girls who insisted that their dad, must “come see.”
This dad was a golf company CEO, leading the most innovative and respected golf company in the world. His two daughters talked him into putting a hat on and standing in the back of a roomful of our people, where he then witnessed our moms and dads help raise funds for his daughters’ mission of serving kids in deep poverty in India. “I don’t know what the heck just happened in there, but I need to be involved”, he said afterward, while pointing to the goosebumps on his arms. This happened about ten years ago, and through his leadership, we hosted five years of sold out black-tie Evening to Remember fundraising galas, where we connected with a First Lady, a Secretary of State, America’s Mayor and many other world-renowned leaders who spoke of the results and power of the Solutions for Change model. A family, whose children simply kept bugging their dad to “come see” resulted in us quadrupling the number of families and kids served. Coincidence? We think not.
The last few years have been anything but easy for us here at Solutions. Like any good story, there is always something menacing or dangerous that pops up. In 2016 we were notified by our state funding partner that a new top down, one-size-fits-all, homelessness response system would now require nonprofits to comply to a new way that fundamentally went against our core values. We pushed back but the system demanded that we change or give up their funding. We were now in a pickle and experiencing flashbacks to 1999 when we refused to convert and were summarily axed. But this time was much different. Our Board of Directors backed us 100% and the residents, graduates and supporters of Solutions, now formidable in numbers, were beyond grateful that we didn’t cave. We sent a letter and voluntarily gave up all $600,000, thanked them for their decades of support of our mission and turned to the only thing we knew could work – Prayer.
We made the heart wrenching decision to lay off 1/3 of our workforce and close critical family programs. But not long afterward, a national news company heard of our plight and flew out from Washington to do a story. A few months later, I got a call from a gentleman who left a voicemail with a long government title after his name. He asked me to return his call right away. As you might imagine, it wasn’t my highest priority that day, or the next day (he says it was three), when I returned his call. And in that forty-minute call, page one of the next story of overcoming was written. Mr. Clarence Carter, the top executive entrusted to run TANF, the nation’s welfare program for families, said that he had watched that national news video and he had to know more about why we would give up all that government funding. I explained that the new approach promoted dependency on government services versus empowerment to build personal capacity. We simply could not break the promise to our families, to those children and to our public who came to us to be empowered and not controlled or managed. There was a long pause like he was waiting for the punchline, which now leads me to what could be the best story of all.
This story is The Overcomers vs. The Churn! Over the past few years, Clarence and I have been talking about Solutions for Change being one of a small handful (like four) nonprofits from around the nation to showcase their results via a national demonstration. I raised my hand to lead the nation’s first demonstration effort right here in northern San Diego. It was a good decision. Southern California has a verified one-fifth of the nation’s entire homeless population within just 100 miles of northern San Diego, where we are based. That’s one-hundred-thousand souls who swirl around in The Churn of handouts, dependency, addiction and mental anguish, and are trapped in a maddening state of victimhood and helplessness. They are living, suffering and dying on our streets in record numbers. We have been waiting for the right time to unleash The Overcomers, and now that time is finally here. Twenty-one Solutions for Change graduates, saved from The Churn and free of the dependency chains that kept them down, now thrive with a hope-filled purpose and confidence and will be the first of what will be hundreds, even thousands nationally. They just launched #WeAreOneUs, a local systems change initiative synched up with national visionaries. These Overcomers have something to say to us all, but especially to those trapped in The Churn.
“Freedom from The Churn is on the way! It will not show up to you in the form of some top down policy with a government seal, or a faceless, heartless system that wants to manage or control you. It will come to you with real love and real compassion and by real people – through us – The Overcomers, who crushed The Churn ourselves. It will come to you with an army of our community partners lifting us up! These are the people who equipped, empowered and loved us back to wholeness, and together, (and we hope many others will join us), we will go up against The Churn. Because, when the least of us become the best of us then, we are one us! ”
Welcome to the next story of Solutions for Change called #WeAreOneUs! It is the epic story of The Overcomers vs. The Churn.
With gratitude and respect,
Chris Megison, President and CEO
Chris Megison
President & CEO
