Holiday Drive 2018
Tags: Homeless, SF, SFHomelessProject, Homelessness, San Francisco

For a lot of people, Christmas brings to mind food, family, laughter, carols and companionship — a time of plenty and of pleasure, brimming with tradition. For many, it’s a time of giving, but also of receiving. A respite from the anxieties of the rest of the year. But, for those who are without stable housing or in otherwise turbulent seasons of life, the festive season can represent a time of great need and loneliness, often compounded by the joy seemingly taking over the world. People who are homeless often experience extreme nostalgia around this time of the year when they miss their loved ones the most, as they recall Christmases past. With this in mind, we at ShelterTech wanted to do something a little different this year to help our local homeless community here in San Francisco.

One of our lovely volunteers flagged that we had 200 Mophie portable phone chargers which had been generously donated to the organization. What better idea than to collect them up and give them away during the holiday season in our inaugural holiday drive?! We packaged each charger up, along with a pair of warm socks and a helpful information page about our online resource directory, AskDarcel. The holiday drive would allow us to provide functional, useful goodies and essentials to the people in the community who need it most. Everyone here at ShelterTech knows the importance of being able to connect people experiencing homelessness with working technology, so these Mophie chargers were just the ticket!

“To get the full value of joy you must have someone to divide it with.”

Crucially — and as with all ShelterTech events — it would also give us an opportunity to connect directly with people with lived experience of homelessness and learn a bit more about what they go through during the holidays and how the simple act of giving could brighten someone’s day.

We collaborated with two distribution channels that were located in two different locations in the city:

Coronado Hotel 373 Ellis St #508, distributed on Wednesday Dec 19th, a drug addiction treatment center.

Dolores Shelter Program1050 S Van Ness, distributed on Thursday Dec 20th, a program thats part of the Dolores Street Community Services to provide homeless overnight stays.

Before passing out our packages, some of our volunteers came together to help spread the holiday spirit. Huge thank you to those who came and put the packages together. Here are some of you working hard:

Some of our lovely volunteers putting on our custom ShelterTech stickers onto each Mophie chargers.

Zip-locking the charger, socks, and Askdarcel info inside the packages.

On day one of the drive, we boxed them up and delivered to the Coronado Hotel for distribution.

Our team being ready to pass out some goodies & candies!

The second day of the drive took place at the Dolores Shelter Program on Dec 20th. We had made flyers to put around the building so occupants could find us and, together with the facility manager, we were able to make sure each person on our roster was there to receive a package.

Setting up in front of the Christmas tree, the perfect spot for gift giving.

Explaining to our recipients about our services.

Showing one of the recipients how to use the charger with their phone.

We learned that the beds at the shelter has built in outlets, right next to the bunk ladder. Amazing!

In the end, we had leftover packages to hand out, but since it was our last day of distribution we left the extra ones with the facilitators to pass out at another time. This project has been a heartwarming experience — from seeing people’s faces light up as they receive the gifts to connecting and forging deeper relationships with our volunteers. It’s easy to forget about the myriad physical, emotional or mental hardships others may be going through as we live our everyday and push forward in our own lives. During this drive, we were able to share conversations and stories with some of those who may be longing to share. We heard incredible stories and were made to feel very much part of a community. Something which we are all building together — those who may have roofs and those who do not. We were reminded of the value of togetherness at Christmas time — of generosity, not only material, but also of time and of spirit.

Thank you to all the volunteers+donators at ShelterTech and facilitators at Coronado Hotel & Dolores Shelter Program for making this holiday drive happen! Shoutout to everyone for spreading some holiday cheer.

If you are interested in learning more about volunteering with us, please don’t hesitate to reach us at info@sheltertech.orgor visit our website at sheltertech.orgto see some of our open roles. We also meet once a week on Wednesdays 6:30pm-7:30pm at Code for America (972 Mission St, San Francisco, CA 94103). Follow us on Facebook (ShelterTech), Twitter (@ShelterTechOrg) or Instagram (@shelter_tech) to learn more!

Please join our cause to help the underserved at ShelterTech!