Read our Member Spotlight on Homeless Garden Project.

Member Spotlight

Homeless Garden Project

Kim Eabry, Executive Director

Santa Cruz

www.homelessgardenproject.org

Each year SCCCU asks its Community Visa cardholders to nominate and select recipients from our annual Community Visa Donation Fund. The Homeless Garden Project has been a recurring recipient, most recently in our 2003-2004 election. The Homeless Garden Project provides training and transitional employment to approximately fifty homeless and formerly homeless people in Santa Cruz County each year. Participants work at a community supported organic garden, learning to grow flowers and produce, which are then sold to the public. The goals of The Garden are to offer a supportive and meaningful work environment that encourages self-esteem, responsibility, and self-sufficiency. It also puts into practice the principles of economic and ecological sustainability.

The Garden has four main elements to its program that all work to build a support system for its participants These four elements are job training and paid employment; connecting participants with appropriate resources in the community such as housing, food stamps, and health services; giving trainees support in working towards personal goals, including helping them identify goals and the steps needed to achieve them such as education and job training; and, providing meals to employees while they are working. This is often the only meal they get during the day.

"I've been a long time member of the SCCCU," says Executive Director Kim Eabry. "I've always loved the Community Visa Donation Fund and how it is so supportive of community organizations, and now my organization is fortunate enough to be one of the recipients!" The Santa Cruz Community Credit Union has also worked with the Garden in several different ways, in addition to the Community Visa Donation Fund. The Garden received a loan for its truck from the SCCCU and it also has a line of credit. The line of credit is an unusual set-up because the Community Credit Union allows our supporters to purchase certificates of deposit at the Credit Union, which are used as collateral for the line of credit. This is crucial for the Garden since it spends most of its money at once in the beginning of the year in order to get the crops planted. Therefore the line of credit is highly beneficial until the harvest comes in at the end of the year. Eabry is also appreciative of the service they receive. "The SCCCU is so supportive, it doesn't have an institutional feel. I can call and talk to someone right away and get the information I need."

The Garden is also a community partner in the Credit Union's Individual Development Account (IDA) program. Trainees at the Garden have been able to enroll in the IDA program, which allows a participant to save $5,000, which is then matched with a grant of $10,000. The IDA savings program can be used to reach three goals: buying a first time home, education and vocational training, and starting or capitalizing a small business. The IDA program coordinator, June Padilla Ponce has given workshops at the Garden about saving money and financial literacy.

As Kim Eabry points out, "It's important that the Credit Union is based locally and that it puts a priority on developing financial resources in non-traditional areas. Banks tend to put their money in areas that already have money. In contrast the Credit Union is an organization that is really working on community development and improving the economic development in our county."

Visit the Homeless Garden Project's retail store, From Our Garden, at: 101 Washington St., Santa Cruz. 426-3609. www.homelessgardenproject.org