Alchemy sf7/5/2023 ![]() ![]() Peery called the interview a chance to learn more about UA’s approach.) (The interview came around the time Half Moon Bay was converting a local property to a SIP hotel and had yet to find a contractor to run it. ![]() “We were feeling very proud that we got to staff a hotel, and they came to us first because they knew how wonderful our work was,” she recalled. When COVID first hit, Miller said, UA hired and trained more than 120 people in five days, for expanded Pit Stop work. Urban Alchemy CEO Lena Miller touted her group’s work in a January 2021 interview with Catherine Peery of KPDO-FM, a community radio station on the San Mateo coast. “Our experience with Urban Alchemy has been nothing short of transformative,” Hastings chief operating officer Rhiannon Bailard told The Frisc. In the Tenderloin, UA also got no-bid city contracts to run two sanctioned tent sites, and University of California’s Hastings School of Law hired the nonprofit to provide security - as an alternative to police - on its campus. (Calling it philanthropic might be a bit of a stretch, given UA was paid at least $1 million for the early hotel work, according to their contract.) “Urban Alchemy was one of the first providers to jump in to help with SIP hotels, which was pretty philanthropic of them at a very tough time,” HSH deputy director of communications and legislative affairs Emily Cohen told The Frisc. “What staff am I going to find to feel safe?” Ryan told The Frisc in June 2020. Homeless Prenatal Program executive director Martha Ryan said many of her employees were juggling work with children at home. Many providers that already ran housing and shelters couldn’t move their staff. But finding staff to work in them was a problem. The city began leasing empty hotels all over town, calling them shelter-in-place (SIP) hotels. There was enormous pressure to move fast. No one had any idea how deadly COVID might become, and the growing sidewalk encampments had put housed neighbors on edge. In the pandemic’s chaotic early days, half of HSH employees were seconded to the Department of Emergency Management. When the pandemic scrambled the city’s homelessness strategy, Urban Alchemy parlayed the hygiene and vehicle work into much more. (By the time the vehicle site closed in March 2021, nearly half of the 55 households it served had moved into permanent housing, according to the city’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, or HSH.) “They did a phenomenal job in my district,” Safaí said, while stressing that the vehicle site was a “different type of service” than the Ansonia. ![]() 2 hearing to discuss UA’s $18.7 million no-bid contract to run the Ansonia, a former youth hostel turned homeless shelter. The site, near the Balboa Park BART station, got rave reviews from Sup. SF then paid Urban Alchemy $1.2 million to run a site for people living in their vehicles: 24/7 security, hygiene services, meals, and connections to services. Hunters Point Family spun out Urban Alchemy to focus on this work in 2018.īy providing services that offer people a sense of dignity, Urban Alchemy likely scored points in City Hall, said UC Berkeley professor of city and regional planning Dan Lindheim: “As a former city manager, that’s the sort of thing that warms my heart, because it’s really needed.” The pilot was a success - it became SF’s Pit Stop program - and Hunters Point Family was hired by SF’s transportation agency to keep subway station elevators clear of drug use and feces, which were making transit use unbearable for wheelchair users. ![]() (Nuru is now facing up to nine years in prison as part of the City Hall corruption scandal.) In 2014, the nonprofit Hunters Point Family was tapped by former Department of Public Works director Mohammed Nuru for a new program in the Tenderloin to keep public toilets open at night and to clean human feces from sidewalks. You can join them.Urban Alchemy’s work began under a different name. In the midst of an unrelenting homelessness crisis, Urban Alchemy is forging a hopeful path. Urban Alchemy has turned the whole notion of incarceration on its head.” “It’s a revolutionary and simple idea, but nobody thought of it before. “Your support will help Urban Alchemy develop more jobs, uplift more neighborhoods, and provide complementary strategies to policing,’’ says Bayron Wilson, co-founder and Chief Operating Officer, who was once incarcerated. For formerly incarcerated people with people skills, emotional intelligence, and empathy, Urban Alchemy provides a living wage and excellent benefits. Urban Alchemy is seeking support for its campaign to hire more people who have been incarcerated to help unhoused residents and keep neighborhoods safe and clean. Guest Services Supervisor Bay Area Job Creation ![]()
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