Worth the risk
The term “Pillars of Philanthropy’’ is a philosophical concept. And philosophical concepts can be tricky. They can run the entire spectrum from shakedown to sainthood. Oftentimes we don’t know for a long time whether or not an organization’s philosophical pillars have allowed them to emerge from the figurative to the practical. So while figurative, they’re important. They give birth to process, to outcomes, a reason to exist at all. Our pillars have allowed this emergence. They are:
Risk tolerance. Reinvention. Perseverance.
These three concepts are key in the development of a mission that started as a way to help some of the most vulnerable people in Iowa: human trafficking survivors. While helping people is not a new concept in our community, a long-term, holistic approach to supporting people in affecting change in their lives is. It can be risky.
Dorothy’s House opened its doors in 2016 to provide a safe place for the practice of life for those whose lives have been interrupted by human trafficking, exploitation and prostitution. Perhaps the greatest risk in those early days was asking for help from our community for a problem that people didn’t know about or believe existed.
The understanding of the crime of human trafficking comes largely from what people see in media and entertainment. What we learned is that this crime has unique characteristics in every geography. And the only way to really understand the dimensions of this crime in our community was to serve people.
That is, to take the risk.
There is no playbook to follow to understand how to meet the needs of a population of people who struggle with complex co-occurring mental and physical health conditions, emotional and developmental delays, and a belief system about the world around them and their station in it that was born from a lifetime of adversity. I needed to know what it felt like to actually do the work, so I moved into the home for the first few months of operation.
I knew there would be things I’d never understand.
I had no idea what to expect in terms of the emotional stability of this deeply traumatized population and the risks that might be associated with them. I did know I had to make sure I could provide as much safety and predictability for my staff as possible.
Pair that with the fact that our participants are coming out of a set of circumstances and relationships that are incredibly dangerous and you have to wonder what to tackle first. It became clear that we had to meet each individual in our care exactly where they were.
Then to build a program with process and structure while meeting the unique needs of everyone who came through our doors. However, every single decision had to sit firmly on a foundation of safety. Safety for our staff, our participants and our property.
Risk was there. But what’s the alternative?
Next came reinvention. We looked at every single participant as the mothers, sisters, daughters, wives, people that they were. Each came with a different set of family experiences, education, trauma experiences and outcomes.
To bring some order to the process of service provision, we implemented a risk assessment tool that helped us to understand where they were on a continuum from vulnerable, at risk, stable, building and thriving.
From there, we worked with them to set some big goals and broke them down into as many achievable items as possible to create a sense of accomplishment each day. For example, owning a car is a goal of everyone in our program. So we made a list of all the obstacles, like getting a driver’s license, income or driving-related crimes/fines that needed to be cleared up.
The beautiful thing about bringing these solutions to our participants is the abundance of services that exist in our community. Instead of creating a job skill training program, we leaned on organizations like Project Iowa and Dress for Success that already do this work in our community.
More importantly – we did not have to hire the expertise in every category.
Finally, perseverance. In a startup you have to commit 110% to your product development. At the end of three years one has to take a hard look at the business and decide if it has filled a need and is it sustainable?
By late 2019, our financial situation was grim. I always believed that if we were serving an important need in our community, then the funding and support would be there. I believed we were filling a need, but our financial runway had me questioning the sustainability of a long-term residential approach.
Then, COVID.
Our typical funding sources went away. A portion of our income comes from churches, and during that time people stopped going to church. We had three women in our home, few resources and did not have enough guidance to know how to keep our participants and staff safe.
In addition, everything our participants relied on disappeared: school, work, AA/NA meetings, etc. It created feelings of hopelessness and despair for many – especially for the vulnerable.
Then the community started showing up in new ways to prop up agencies like ours as we sifted through change to survive and thrive. I believe that sheer will to endure – perseverance – was the key to overcoming the adversity we faced.
Being unafraid, constant problem-solving and hard work have created measurable outcomes.
The population we serve is challenging, and the service provision in a residential space is very intimate. The relational approach to helping people provides a miracle a day. And we now have women who have completed AA, B.A. and certificate programs. They are being reunited with their children and contributing to our community. It’s worth the risk.
Why is philanthropy important to our community?
Philanthropy is social entrepreneurialism at its best. It shines a light on the needs of a community that are too narrow or controversial for general welfare and don’t always make the cut when it comes to effecting changes in our law or public funding. When not-for-profits operate like a business – where people are often the product – it closes gaps in meeting needs in ways that allow the community to decide what is important to them.
