By Dianne Anderson

Everyone that is anyone doing big things in the community usually has one special internal motivator in common – they can’t stop until they right the wrongs to balance the scales.

So it is with Shakoya Green, executive director of Thomas House Shelter in Garden Grove.

Born and raised in Compton, both of her parents were substance abusers. She was raised by her grandmother and the foster care system until age seven, but graduated from high school with a strong sense of community and a close-up understanding of what teens need to know.

Her grandmother had an impact on her life, she said, always the helper at church, and feeding the homeless.

“She always kept us engaged in something in the community. At age 14, I started being a peer advocate for Compton Unified, educating middle school students on substance abuse,” she said.

Green would go into middle schools to educate teens on what substance abuse is, the devastation it can cause, and why they should resist the urge to try it.

“I was the first in my family to go to college and get a bachelor’s and master’s degree. I went to San Diego State University initially going for family law, but then I decided I’m going to do social work. So, here I am 23 years later,” she said.

Whatever negative early childhood experience led her to the doorstep of Thomas House Shelter, it’s the place where she knows about family trauma firsthand, and how to get them to stability.

Throughout her career, she has worked in several areas of child development, foster youth, mental health, populations dealing with incarceration, homelessness, substance abuse, child abuse and welfare.

Families live in individual apartments at the shelter where they get all services free, including life skills classes, parenting education, and teen case management. The program accommodates on average three to five people per family. One bedroom can house three, two bedrooms house five, and three bedroom units can house seven individuals.

While they don’t have to come into the program working, they must be willing to work.

“Our goal is for individuals to pay off their debt and save a minimum of $10,000 so that when they leave us, they understand that with the job they have, they need a cushion. They need to have some savings,” she said.

Some come in with a high school diploma, or a few with a college education, but most are scraping by on minimum wage, which doesn’t go far. The cost of living in Orange County requires $44 an hour, and she said there is a huge need to continue to support individuals when they leave the program so they can remain in their homes.

“We want to make sure they’re able to sustain their housing. If you think about the number of individuals who come through our program, about 60% actually have fled a domestic violence relationship,” she said.

Participants access financial literacy classes, life skills and parenting classes. On Thursday evenings, a variety of professionals come to share their experiences. They have a bank representative to talk money, a mental health provider, or those coming in to build on the skill set.

“[It’s] so that individuals leave us happy and whole and have the unaddressed trauma addressed,” she said.

They learn what it takes to get into housing. They create their budget, and are required to bring their check stubs and receipts of what they’ve purchased to help keep them on top of their money.

She said they are required to save 80% after they’ve paid off their bills, which is required to get into an apartment. Landlords frown on collections.

With Green’s background in fundraising, she has pulled down millions of dollars to increase revenue for nonprofits, but she said it would all be impossible without funding from governmental and private entities, such as what they’ve received from Orange County Community Foundation. She commended Tammy Tumbling for the work that they are doing to support their African American Alliance Fund.

“Specifically, those funds went to professional development. I, as a new Black leader here in Orange County, the funds went to some training that I could benefit from to continue to grow and enhance the program here at Thomas House,” she said.

Last year, the shelter’s strategic five-year plan focused on purchasing additional units. Currently, they support about 60 families per year in their two core programs, transitional shelter services and supportive services program, along with the homeless prevention program.

Families that graduate from Thomas House go out into the community, into permanent housing with several support systems in place and continued case management, parenting, mental health services, and youth development.

But she is concerned that people coming into the shelter are staying longer. The average length of stay was about six months pre-COVID. Since then, it’s about nine to 12 months.

“Our goal is to eradicate generational poverty and homelessness and funding is the only way we can do it. We have to pay our staff, our bills, provide food, shelter and the necessities for our families to do what they need to do,” she said.

Recently, the shelter also received funding help from CalOptima and CalAIM, which will go a long way in helping with capacity building. So far, she said they have hired their first housing navigator, their first program director, who is a licensed marriage and family therapist. They also hired a career development specialist.

“Ultimately, we’re looking to get people back to a six-month length of stay so they can support more families,” she said.

Thomas House is a small organization, open for 37 years, but she said they are in it for the long haul, and they know how to budget on a shoestring.

“When you look at our budget we are less than $2 million,” she said. “We’re squeezing those pennies. That’s one of my goals to continue to grow our budget so we can continue to provide great services.”
For more information, see https://www.thomashouseshelter.org/