Winter Sanctuary, Sacramento’s interfaith, rotating homeless shelter, is currently facing a substantial gap in its budget. The program, which nightly shelters 100 homeless adults, is set to open on December 1st and run through March 31st. However, the program will not be opening on December 1st if the funding gap is not significantly narrowed.

Christie Holderegger, Vice President of Volunteers of America, spoke of the urgent need for this program, “Our neighbors are experiencing homelessness for a variety of reasons and many for the first time. They are looking to us, all of us to help them out of this desperate situation. As a community we can reach and uplift them. We saw hundreds of lives changed last year through Winter Sanctuary, both homeless guests and volunteers.”

Winter Sanctuary began in winter 2010 as a collaborative effort between Sacramento Steps Forward, Volunteers of America and local interfaith congregations. The program brought together local faith congregations, 24 to be exact, who stepped up to host their homeless neighbors and provide shelter, meals, and a welcoming community.

From December through March, a total of 550 unduplicated guests were served through the program, 24 congregations participated and over 2,000 community volunteers lent a hand.

“Winter Sanctuary is truly a successful model of community collaboration at its best. This program demonstrates how constituents from many different areas of our community can come together to help our neighbors,” said Ben Burton, Executive Director of Sacramento Steps Forward.

A volunteer from St. Mark’s United Methodist Church remarked on their experience as a host congregation, “The media constantly bombards us with statistics of the millions of persons in pain and hurting and we have a tendency to throw up our hands and say we can do nothing to make things better. But we had an opportunity in the two periods hosting Winter Sanctuary to affect the lives of a few people in a profound way.”

Yet the funding gap remains, and if not off-set will have an immediate, negative impact on the program’s start date, as well as the 100 homeless folks who could have come inside to escape Sacramento’s cold, wet and rainy winters.

HOW TO GIVE:

Sacramento Steps Forward is encouraging the community to donate. To make a tax-deductible donation, visit their website at SacramentoStepsForward.org and click the red ‘DONATE’ button to be taken to their secure Pay-Pal site.

*We would like to thank the following foundations and donors for supporting Winter Sanctuary: Sacramento Region Community Foundation, the Sierra Health Foundation, the Winn Foundation (with help from Supervisor Phil Serna), the River District, the Downtown Sacramento Partnership and the Teichert Foundation. Individual donors have graciously contributed almost $4,000, and Fremont Presbyterian Church contributed $1,500. The Wal-Mart Foundation donated 300 sleeping bags.