This year, St. Luke's LifeWorks in Stamford, Connecticut celebrates its 125th year of helping those less fortunate in the community. Beginning back before the turn of the century, their organization started as a small outreach effort and has transformed and grown over the years to become an organization that today provides services to over 1,000 people a year at 13 sites located throughout Fairfield County. Their services focus on providing education, housing and support services to people who have become homeless-both families and single adults, people recovering from mental illness; and those living with HIV/AIDS. St. Luke's LifeWorks provides emergency, transitional and permanent supportive housing as well as an educational program and childcare.

In response to an ever-increasing need for services, St. Luke's LifeWorks established the Center for Children and their Families in 1991. Considered one of their major accomplishments, the Center was created to house a variety of social service organizations all under one roof in order to provide a holistic "wrap around" approach to helping people. Today, the Center for Children and their Families houses 17 social service agencies and serves as a regional social service delivery center. Each year, more than 25,000 families and children with critical needs access services through various providers that offer help with substance abuse, mental health, alternative therapies, domestic violence issues, parenting, literacy, life skills training, medical services and mentoring.

Accomplishments in the Past Year

* The purchase of the Rose Park Apartments, a multi-family dwelling, in partnership with the City of Stamford to provide additional housing for families as well as serve as a place to relocate families as a result of the City's lead abatement program.

* Groundwork has been laid to introduce a new Learn A Living educational program that will assist program participants in acquiring basic life skills as well as enhancing their career development. Designed to reach full capacity in three years, it is slated to begin mid-September, 2003. The program will ultimately serve 200 clients a year and be a reproducible model.

* Bright Horizons Family Solutions completed the second year as managers of The Children's Community, St.Luke's full-day childcare center. With 30 spaces guaranteed for children from the Family Program, Bright Horizons has been able to bring more children in from the community and their current census is up over 70 children at present.

* One of the most exciting things to take place as a result of their affiliation with Bright Horizons is their approval through the Bright Horizons Foundation to be a site for a "Bright Space." Bright Spaces are play areas specially designed to meet the needs of children living in a shelter environment. Through St. Luke's LifeWorks' partnership with Bright Horizons a space within The Children's Community has been identified for development into a Bright Space. This area will be renovated with the help of funding from the foundation and will be accessible to Children's Community children during the day and children living in the Family Program at night and on the weekends.

* Additionally, St. Luke's LifeWorks assumed the management of Metcalf House, a 10-unit single room occupancy site for persons comprising a high-risk population that includes persons with psychiatric disabilities and substance abuse problems.

Going Forward

St. Luke's LifeWorks is dedicated to bringing an end to homelessness. Key leaders from around the country and in their own State of Connecticut have been working on the Blueprint to End Homelessness as they know it. St. Luke's LifeWorks's most recent project that is the creation of affordable family housing at their Center for Children and their Families site. St. Luke's LifeWorks and their subsidiary the Fairfield Community Development Corporation were just awarded $275,000 by the City of Stamford to facilitate the demolition of an under-utilized section of the building that will enable them to construct 16 units of permanent family housing in its place following the supportive housing model of providing on-site case management and support. This will be a tremendous boost for families struggling to maintain their independence and will move them closer to achieving their goal of creating a better community for us all.

St. Luke's LifeWorks' mission is to help individuals and families who are affected by homelessness, HIV/AIDS, and mental illness, learn to make their lives work better. They provide programs for life-long learning, emergency and supportive housing and other needed direct aid. They aspire to be a model caring community where people learn a living.