SHARE! SERVICES TO THE COMMUNITY

Housed 448 homeless people with mental health and/or substance use in permanent supportive housing throughout Los Angeles County.

In 2022, SHARE! hosted 3,451 self-help support group meetings, including online, in-person and hybrid. 42,087 people attended them. People from around the county, state, country and the world were able to attend because SHARE! added Zoom technology to all its meeting rooms.

Made 2,151 referrals to self-help support groups throughout Los Angeles.

976 people contributed their volunteer efforts at SHARE! Culver City and SHARE! Downtown.

Trained 682 Peer Specialists in SHARE!’s innovative techniques that greatly increase people’s willingness to change anti-social behaviors.

Reached 9,234 subscribers through SHARE!’s electronic newsletter, and drew 53,593 views of SHARE!’s website shareselfhelp.org.

SHARE! opened a second peer respite, the North Hollywood Peer Respite, that served 130 people. Homeless people made up 113 of the 130. SHARE! housed all but 14 in the two-week stays Twelve people entered rehab. At the SHARE! Recovery Retreat in Monterey Park, more than 100 people enjoyed their two-week stay jump-starting their recovery. Sixty-five percent of residents achieved their goal (to get housing, a job, maintain sobriety, reconnect with family and more.) while at the Retreat

SHARE! COLLABORATIVE HOUSING

SHARE! housed 448  people and opened 10 new houses, increasing the number of beds in the program to 406. 

In SHARE!’s Gateway Cities Council of Government contract, SHARE!’s efforts housed 109 homeless people, 82 of whom got employment.

In SHARE!’s LAHSA Recovery Re-Housing contract, SHARE! housed 23 residents with Emergency Housing Vouchers, in their own units and are sustaining them with SHARE! Peer Bridger support. Most needed help getting ID, SS cards, birth certificates. Many have reunified with family.

SHARE! Collaborative Housing serves vulnerable populations. 49% of residents are seniors (55+). SHARE! Collaborative Housing residents had high levels of community participation:

• 57% employed
• 75% attend self-help support groups
• 20% pursue education
• 68% volunteer
• 41% housed within 24 hours

More than 222 agencies made referrals to SHARE! Collaborative Housing.SHARE! Collaborative Housing became more efficient by adding an app that automatically makes a floor plan for the house to easily determine how many people can live in the house and where furniture, computers, TVs and other amenities can go.

Landlords Rental Service starting volunteering to provide the market rents for the SHARE! houses, so rents are now fairer to everyone.

SHARE! TRAINING

• With funding from the California Department of Health Care Access and Information and CalMHSA, SHARE! taught 188 Peer Specialists evidence-based Peer Support practices. We prepared 89 for Medi-Cal Peer Support Specialist Certification. SHARE! has trained 828 people since 2016, from 28 counties statewide.
• CalMHSA approved SHARE! as a Medi-Cal Certification training entity for preparing Peer Support Specialists and Parent, Family and Caregivers for the peer workforce in California.
• With funding from the California Department of Health Care Services (DHCS), SHARE! provided technical assistance and support to 59 California peer organizations, including 10 webinars.
• SHARE!’s Peer Workforce Conference—Bridging Research and Practice in January attracted 383 registrants. Presenters were affiliated with UC Berkeley, University of Texas, Rand Corporation, George Mason University, Rutgers University, the American University in Bulgaria and many peer-run programs across the country.
• SHARE!’s Supervision of the Peer Workforce conference in April attracted 600 registrants and highlighted SHARE!’s work in supervising peer staff for 28 years.

COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION

• As a member of California’s Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission’s Client and Family Leadership Committee, SHARE! Chief Program Officer Jason Robison successfully moved a proposal to scale Peer Services in California by directing 7% of statewide MHSA funding to Peer Services. The Client and Family Leadership Committee is finding legislative partners and looking for ways to bring the proposal to the MHSOAC in the next legislative year.
• At the invitation of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, SHARE! Chief Program Officer Jason Robison provided input on priorities for the creation of the National Office of Recovery in Washington, D.C.
• SHARE! continued to participate in Peer Action 4 Change which advocated for conservatorship reform, shared housing, Peer Warmlines and culturally competent recovery-oriented mental health education.

AGENCY DEVELOPMENTS

• SHARE! partnered with the Matern Law Group to expand SHARE! Collaborative Housing, working with State Senator Ben Allen. Sen. Allen toured a house and helped SHARE! develop strategies to make state funding more available for SHARE! Collaborative Housing.
• SHARE! promoted Camille Dennis and Maria Gonzalez to be Directors, and developed a new level of managers to allow room to grow. SHARE! gave staff bonuses, which they used for tuition, home repairs, a new car, moving expenses, paying off credit cards, etc.
• SHARE! honored John Jude Duran, Courtney Friel and Constance Gilkie for their outstanding contributions to self-help support groups and recovery at the 23rd Annual SHARE! Recovery Awards in January. The Franklin E. Ulf Award for Outstanding Corporate Leadership was presented to Lewis C. Horne from CBRE. Laura Angelini, Lolo and Symon entertained everyone.
• SHARE! partnered with the Executive Service Corps to develop SHARE!-specific supervision training for new supervisors at SHARE!. This included SHARE! the Big Picture, Performance Feedback, Meeting Management, Delegation, Presentation/Public Speaking, Time Management, and Reporting and Documentation.SHARE! usually promotes existing staff to be supervisors and most do not have managerial experience, so having supervision training specifically for new SHARE! supervisors is a great upgrade.SHARE! continues to provide Executive Service Corps coaches to all new supervisors.
• An anonymous survey of SHARE! employees showed that 100% align with SHARE! mission and almost all look forward to coming to work every day.
• In a joint project with UCLA, SHARE! began using Salesforce to track outcomes in SHARE! Collaborative Housing. UCLA is working on having an independent evaluation of SHARE! Collaborative Housing completed next year.
• SHARE! Public Relations consultant Amy Prenner spread information about SHARE and its programs in 42 press releases that were picked up by many media outlets.
• Prof. Louis Brown from the University of Texas, Houston is conducting an evaluation of the SHARE! Peer Toolkit—tools to help Peer Specialists help others in recovery. 275 peer specialists participated in the evaluation.
• SHARE!’s Independent Audit had no findings.
• SHARE! was contracted with: California Department of Health Care Services; California Department of Health Care Access and Information; Los Angeles County Departments of Mental Health, Public Social Services, and Health Services; Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, County Supervisor Holly Mitchell, City of Los Angeles Councilmembers Gil Cedillo,  Bob Blumenfield and Mike Bonin; Gateway Cities Council of Governments; City of Manhattan Beach; Cedars-Sinai Foundation;  Kaiser Foundation.

DOWNLOAD SHARE! ACCOMPLISHMENTS PDF: SHARE! ACCOMPLISHMENTS 2022

SHARE! empowers people to change their own lives and provides them a loving, safe, non-judgmental place where they can find community, information, and support.

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