If you were unable to attend the ribbon-cutting moment, you can still enjoy the sight in this video:

We’re so grateful to our supporters who made this moment possible!

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Service Soars with Humility

Our Quad-Cities celebrates a new home today for an organization instrumental in finding homes for the homeless.

Humility of Mary Housing, Inc., cuts a ribbon 3 p.m. today at a new facility at 3805 Mississippi Ave., Davenport. Today’s grand opening marks a welcome transition for the group that arose from a religious order with more than 100 years of service to our community. The Sisters of Humility opened the St. Vincent’s Home for orphans in the 1890s. Their community-based ministry launched transitional housing efforts 21 years ago to coach homeless Quad-Citians into jobs and careers.

Today, Humility Housing operates 47 apartments and, last year, directly assisted 75 single parents and 150 children on the path to self-sufficiency.

The results are outstanding.

- 83 percent find permanent housing.

- 92 percent report more education and job training.

- 44 percent report increases in earned income by the time they left the program.

- For 33 percent, that income exceeded $1,000 per month.

Those results come from a program where 61 percent of participants are survivors of domestic violence, 16 percent had drug dependency, and 15 percent reported treatment for mental illness.

Those stellar results are what convinced community partners to support the $850,000 purchase and renovation of this new headquarters.

Assisting the less fortunate in our community is not a problem that will be solved and crossed off a list. It is a biblical imperative, also shared by many faiths, that continues forever. The Sisters of Humility’s century-long service to our community attests to their compassionate commitment. That service attracts a legion of volunteers and generous supporters who made today’s grand opening possible.

Please join them by visiting today’s open house, or contacting them to learn how to support this effective ministry.

You are invited to our new office open house!

We moved the major items this weekend, so today was the official “moving day” for HMHI’s new office headquarters. All personnel pitched in to begin the process of making the our headquarters not only a functional workplace, but also a homey, friendly one.

What we have started will be an ongoing process. We’re working hard to make our space fully functional as soon as we can, so that we can better assist our program participants.

We will be inviting you to our Open House. Be watching here for more information. It will be here in a flash!

The Sarah Marie Young Ensemble spiced up the brunch with jazz.

The good times were rolling at our second New Orleans-style Jazz Brunch fundraiser at the Crow ValleyGolf Club Sunday. The setting was lovely, and the musical stylings of the Sara Marie Young ensemble from Chicago added the touch that took “special” to “superlative.”

But the most important element of all: all the event’s proceeds will assist single parent families who are experiencing homelessness.

A program participant inspired the group by sharing how, by receiving the right help at the right time, she was able to move her family from homelessness to housing stability and a future full of hope.

We value what everyone contributes. The financial support of our event’s attendees translates into direct assistance to the most needy and vulnerable. And, just as important as the financial support, we value the “hands on” help that others can provide. One attendee wrote us afterward:

Just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed the Jazz Brunch today. The food was great, the musical group was fantastic and the stories told of the turnarounds in peoples’ lives were so inspiring. Saw a few tears here and there. If I could be of any help volunteering my time, I would be grateful to help. I paint, wash windows, do light repairs and can pick up donations. Please let me know if you can use some help.

It is all about helping the families that need it most. To all our supporters, we thank you. If you missed the Jazz Brunch this year, maybe you can make it next year. Your assistance and support everyday is what makes our program a success. Thank you!

Sr. Mary Ann Vogel unlocks new office building at 3805 Mississippi Avenue.

While we have loved our historic location on East 12th Street in Davenport, HMHI has outgrown our current office building. After many months of squeezing usage out of every available square foot, we’re happy to announce our move to our upcoming new location at

3805 Mississippi Avenue in Davenport

Renovations are underway to outfit our new office building to meet our needs.

We’re still on target to make our move in October. The building is being prepped to meet our needs. Additional space will allow us to better serve our participants, giving them greater access to support.

Here's a glimpse of the building exterior. Volunteers are helping us improve and beautify it for our upcoming move.

We are really excited and are working overtime (literally!) to make our move as economically as possible while still maintaining our regular program operations. It will all be worth the extra effort!

We will keep you posted here as the Moving Day approaches.

Outdated data awaits shredding.

HMHI accepts responsibility for the security of this data. While we want to save important documentation that the family may need to access, we also don’t want to hold critical data longer than is necessary nor compromise the confidentiality of the data.

To help us safely dispose of files not updated within the last ten years, we used the services of a professional shredding company.

Confidentiality….meet the new technology!

Andrew carried the data, locked it, and rolled it to the mobile shredder.

With an eye always on proper care of our planet, HMHI ensured that the shredded paper was recycled.

The data is efficiently shredded and taken away for recycling.

Catholic charity sale gives families a Fresh Start by Mary Louise Speer

The sign over the door states Sister Sale, but there are no sisters for sale at the 22nd annual Fresh Start benefit sale at the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds, Davenport.

However there are plenty of gently used items available — gleaming fine china, silverware, comforters, toys and furniture. All proceeds will support the Humility of Mary Housing program and services for single-parent families. The sale kicked off Tuesday and runs through noon Friday.

“We’ve had families tell us we’ve been able to open doors for them when many doors were closed,” said Sister Mary Ann Vogel.

Her mother, Gertrude Vogel, launched the sale in 1990 to help support the housing program. Eventually, the event outgrew the original location and now takes place at the Mississippi Valley Fairgrounds, and Gertrude Vogel continues to support the event.

“I think the thing that’s so interesting with this sale is the volunteers,” Mary Ann Vogel said.

The list of helpers ranges from long-time volunteers, Vogel family members and youth from Arrowhead Ranch in Coal Valley, Ill., who supplied muscle power to load and unload two truckloads of items.

“There’s such a neat camaraderie with everyone,” volunteer Alice Ellison of Davenport said as she carried a brightly colored play table to the checkout for a young mother.

Ellison and other volunteers attended Catholic schools taught by sisters of the Congregation of Humility of Mary, and she recalls those years with appreciation.

“I had a good rapport with them,” she said.

The 2011 sale features an unusual collection of costume jewelry brought to the sale by Vogel’s sister who lives in Seattle. The collage of rings, earrings and necklaces originally belonged to a distributor who sold and collected the jewelry back in the 1970s. The daughter agreed to donate the jewelry to the sale, knowing the money would support a good cause, Mary Ann Vogel said.

The furniture section features dining room table sets, a wood settee, dressers and a fireplace. Volunteer Ivan TeBrake of Sun City, Ariz., said he couldn’t make up his mind on what item he would want to take home. But the fireplace, complete with mantel and equipped with sound, light and heat controls, is definitely a one-of-a-kind donation, he said.

He is married to Mary Ann Vogel’s other sister, and the summer trip is an annual pilgrimage for the couple.

“I do it for Sister Mary Ann,” he said. “But you get a lot of satisfaction.”

Mary Ann Vogel is pleased that two of this year’s onsite helpers are the granddaughters of long-time volunteers. The next generation is getting ready to help with ongoing efforts to provide transitional and permanent housing for families in need, she said.

The program operates 47 apartments for about 100 children and their parents. Originally, these families were locked in worries over finding safe places to spend the night and having enough to eat. Volunteers and staff work with the families to carve out brighter futures.

“You see the changes when there’s a stable home environment and the parents working on training and education,” she said.

Photo credit: Larry Fisher/QUAD-CITY TIMES

A key finding in the brief, entitled Economy Bytes: Effect of State and Local Budget Cuts on Homelessness, is the identification of nine states where an elevated level of vulnerability exists. This designation reflects:

• a homelessness rate higher than the national rate,
• multiple risk factors for increasing homelessness, and
• cuts to either public sector jobs or public assistance.

Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington, DC.. Four states among these nine have the highest levels of vulnerability because they made cuts to both public sector jobs and public assistance. These four states are Arizona, Louisiana, Oregon, and Washington, DC .

U.S. map showing areas of increased vulnerability to becoming homeless. Courtesy of National Alliance to End Homelessness.

The brief, which is the third in the Economy Bytesseries, also details how in the past two fiscal years (2010 and 2011), 24 states and the District of Columbia made cuts to public assistance and 34 made cuts to public sector jobs.

Today, in a related news event, the Senate passed and the President signed the Budget Control Act of 2011. What will that mean for future U.S. budgeting? What will happen next? Here’s a concise summation from the National Alliance to End Homelessness:

… the Act sets up a bipartisan committee, comprised of senators and representatives selected by each chamber’s leadership, tasked with reducing the deficit by an additional $1.5 trillion over 10 years. This committee must agree on where the necessary spending cuts or revenue increases will come from by November 23, 2011, and the committee’s plans must be approved by both the House and Senate by December 23, 2011. If a deal is not reached by December 23, cuts will automatically be triggered that would cut spending across the board (defense and non-defense spending) by $1.2 trillion spread evenly over 10 years. Programs targeted toward low-income individuals and families would largely be exempt from these automatic cuts, though the specifics of this provision remain unclear.

A moral budget prioritizes programs that provide for those who are poor and vulnerable.

Let us work toward a moral budget that keeps people in appropriate, safe and healthy housing and allows families to live together.

This video news clip from Colorado Springs details local fears of how upcoming budget cuts could affect every sector of their community, including those on disability: