Je'net Kreitner, CEO & Founder, Grandma's House of Hope | Orange County, CA
This interview originally aired on The Fem Word Radio show on Rukus Avenue Radio, a Dash Radio station.
Monika Samtani:
Je’net Kreitner, Grandma’s House of Hope
Hello everyone. I'm Monika Samtani and this is The Fem Word. It feels like I've lost track of what day or time it is during COVID-19 pandemic, and in order to flatten the curve, it seems like the whole world has come to a standstill with the exception of essential services and healthcare workers. We want to greatly thank them and tell them how much we appreciate them.
Today I'm actually joined by someone who I also personally see as a hero, Je'net Kreitner. She's the founder of Grandma's House of Hope in Orange County, California, where there are over 12,000 homeless people just in Orange County. So Grandma's House of Hope started in 2004, and Je'net, you have women in your shelters who are homeless; who have dealt with domestic violence; and human trafficking, amongst other issues within marginalized communities. People may not know that you know what it feels like to be hungry and to be homeless, having been through it yourself at age 36. Talk to us a little bit about that.
Je'net Kreitner:
On January 24, 1994, I was left at the side of the road right outside of Disneyland with my seven-year-old son, 20 bucks in my pocket, and two suitcases, which in those days were not on wheels. So dragging them down the street, my son and I spent that first night in a phone booth. They still existed then. And we watched the fireworks at Disneyland from the phone booth. It was raining. I was desperate. I called my mother to see if she would help me, and unbeknownst to me, in the time I had been gone for three years, she had succumbed to early-onset Alzheimers so she was terrified and confused. When I asked her if she would come to pick me and her grandson up, she actually said something about there being an earthquake, and she was just completely unable to communicate with me. I hung up the phone and I looked at my son and I thought, "I don't even know how to put one foot in front of the other right now."
There was actually a woman, a prostituted woman named Karen, who got me out of that phone booth and took me back to her hotel room that night. She sold everything I had. It didn't bother me because she gave me a place out of the rain to be with my son. Funny story. I mean, she was actually wearing my clothes in the morning and clearly intended to keep them. Interesting things happen on the streets.
The next six months were a very difficult time for me and for my son. The events leading up to it had left me in a very vulnerable and traumatized space. I had recalled early childhood memories that had resurfaced three years earlier when I was performing in a show called Homeless: A Street Opera. Ironically, I was a pregnant eight month old heroin addict who gave birth and died on stage singing the whole thing because it was "an opera." But unbeknownst to me, when I was doing the show, my story from my childhood, although socioeconomically very different from the character's, they were the same story. A father who was abusive, who molested me, and a mother who didn't protect her from that. And I successfully suppressed all of those memories by becoming an actress and pouring myself into roles until I performed in this one. About six months after the show closed, I had a family member take me out to breakfast and tell me what this had triggered for him. And it was like that classic scene in a movie where things start spinning in your head and you see images.
Monika:
When you got yourself back together, you started taking homeless women into your home. Since then, you've housed thousands of people and fed millions of people. Can you even believe that this is your life that we're talking about and what you've done with it?
Grandma’s House of Hope
Je'net:
I scratch my head often, just kind of when the numbers come out, and I realized, look at what one person who was once huddled in a phone booth could end up doing. You know, it has changed my whole perspective. That's why our mission is to empower the invisible. I felt invisible in that phone booth, except to Karen, that girl that rescued us that evening. Nobody wanted to take time with me. My case was too complicated. I was significantly traumatized, and nobody had time for my story. So, when I got back on my feet and was lucky enough to have my own home, I took care of my mom during the last give years of her life. When she passed away, we had an empty bedroom and I couldn’t stand it.
When my mom passed away, I befriended a woman by the name of Harriet at a bus stop. We figured we'll just let her have mom's room and we'll see if we can help her get back on her feet. It took us about six months to find her a good senior living situation that she could afford because she did have an income. After Harriet left, we brought in a family, a mom and three children, took care of them for a while, and after that it was somebody else and then somebody else. One day, my husband and I looked at each other and noticed that we had more people living with us than our own family. So it was time to get out of the way and turn that into our first shelter location.
For three years, we tried to figure it out. We lost money trying to make it work on a business model that wasn’t working very well for us. Eventually we added onto the house, made more room, and we started to see that we could bring in more money than we were putting out. So, we filed for our 501(c)(3) license at that time and became a nonprofit charity so we could pour all that money back into caring for the people at our home. That was house number one, and a couple of years later we added 26 beds, and every year after that we added more and more. Currently we have 17 shelter sites with 190 beds. And we’re still growing because we're about to open up an isolation and quarantine house.
Monika:
And the reason for that is COVID-19. It's a grave situation for so many, and maybe just maybe we're already seeing people become homeless because of this. Have you seen an uptick?
Je'net:
I don't think we've seen so much of an uptick in the homeless because there are a lot of programs that are preventing evictions and things like that right now. We haven't seen that as much as trying to strategize around social distancing in a shelter location where we used to have five people in a master bedroom. And now to social distance, you can't use a bunk bed for instance. We need to move people out of those bedrooms with bunks so we can keep people spatially apart from one another. Our shelter is a homelike setting, they’re not like a big warehouse with bed next to bed.
Monika:
You have a welcoming and warm environment.
Je'net:
That was always really important to me because when I was homeless and I walked into a couple of somber living homes or program houses, they weren't welcoming at all. You're lucky if you got some sheets to put on your bed and there were no pictures on the wall. And it felt like what, it was just a place to like crash. I wanted it to be so much more to be welcoming for people; I want them to feel seen and tell their stories and let us help them through this trauma. My trauma was so extreme, including being trafficked by my father when I was six in an underground pornography ring. But that kind of trauma, and this is not an unusual story for us to hear; can't be solved in a 30 day turn around and put them into housing on their own kind of a model.
We have longer stays in our program than most others. In fact, in our senior program, we don't have an end date. Some of our seniors stay with us through five, seven years. Some of them go into hospice with us and we take care of them all the way through their final journey. Having a warm environment where, typically before COVID came about, we'd put three people in a bedroom like a bunk bed and a single. We're having to eliminate that third bed in every room. And because we're all so closely tied to each other, we really felt like we needed to get an isolation quarantine house started. Luckily, I had just rented three new properties for some expansion that we had received from the county. And I was holding this one house for a new human trafficking-specific program, but that's been pushed back because of COVID. So I have a house that I can use for the next three to six months to do isolation services for the folks that we work with that have significant persistent mental illness who won't do well in some of the county provided programs.
Monika:
In the house that you're talking about, it's very important for your organization and the workforce plus the people that you're housing to stay safe. Is that why you're taking those steps to be able to have that quarantine home. Does everybody stay there for approximately two weeks before you then are able to bring them out into the regular homes?
Je'net:
Luckily, we don't have an active case right now. We're preparing that house right now. We had to wait to see if some funding would come through and so we are starting to see some financial support that will support the program. We are getting started as we speak; we are building beds, putting in mattresses, and dining room furniture. We should be open in about a week.
Monika:
So you're taking all the right steps, you're doing what you need to do. What about the actual staff? Has it been okay in terms of motivating them to come in? Do you have all the equipment that you need for everybody? I know that's been difficult even in hospitals.
Je'net:
It has been difficult. Our first criteria when we were emergency planning was, how will our staff approach this because everybody's fearful. My staff was also fearful. At the beginning, I had a lot of housing staff that wanted to work remotely which works in some situations, but our coverage needs to be 24/7 right now. So, because people are cooped up in our programs, if my staff decided they weren't going to work, then 150 to 170 people right now who are in our program would not have anybody around to take care of their needs. I'm very proud of my staff. They really stepped up. My service coordinators, our entry-level position; job is day to day active service, every single one of them showed up to serve. Our development staff are working remotely to some degree, but our housing staff is showing up, which is awesome.
Monika:
Amazing. There are so many heroes coming out of all of this. You were saying that luckily there are programs to help those who may have lost their job or at risk of losing their job. But one thing I found interesting - and scary is that the national domestic abuse hotline on a regular basis receives about 2000 calls a day. And of those calls, now there are those that are more directly related to COVID-19. But what I found even more scary is that in some communities the total call volume is actually down. And not because cases are down, but because the ones who are most in danger are unable to reach out. So does that concern you at all? That the ones that you are able to help, that you have the facilities for aren't able to tell you that they need help?
Je'net:
I think that's always our worry for those that are coming to us from a domestic violence situation. That's always our fear. I think the reason we're seeing those calls or people not able to call is because one of the things they're thinking to themselves is, "if I leave here, I may be putting my life in danger too. So where do I go? How do I get out?", I think that women who are often under this kind of abuse by a man or being told things like if you go out the door, you're going to be arrested. There's a stay at home order. I think all of those things play a factor in this. But what we're seeing in terms of an uptick in domestic violence and our biggest concern is around hunger issues around children, which is also very near and dear to my heart.
I remember not being able to buy my son a 99 cent hamburger one time when I had just paid everything in my pocket for a motel room. I'll never forget the look on his face when he looked at me, and knowing that I had change on the counter at that motel, he looked at me and he knew he couldn't even ask for that hamburger and it broke me. That was like my worst moment as a parent, not being able to put food in my child's mouth. So now take that story and fast forward, and imagine right now, so these are kids in our Nana's Kids program, which is a food hunger relief program for children who would rely on the school cafeteria as their primary source of food and then don't have food on the weekends and during the summer holidays. That's what the program was designed to meet.
Most of our kids are living in motels or doubled and tripled up with other families. So now imagine, there's no food during the week, and now there's no food over the weekend. And there's some more people at home needing to eat. The anger issues, the irritation with parents not knowing how to manage their children all day long. They're antsy. They don't know how to teach their kids. The problems that they're seeing, they're not capable of teaching algebra to their children. Then on top of that, they're hungry. So, we've had a 700% increase in requests for our program at Nana's Kids since this started. A lot of these families have a school program where you can go to school and get your breakfast and lunch. But caveat on that is you must go to school with your children every day to get your two meals every day. And these are the kids we work with; their parents can't get on the bus and do that. It doesn't make any financial sense. They're out getting more exposure to the COVID virus, and it just doesn't make sense for them. We're piggybacking with some of those programs and we're going on the final day of the week so that the families know we are there on Thursdays and we're getting bags of food out that will carry them through the whole week. It broke my heart the first time we had to turn the last 30 cars away, each of them with hungry children in them waiting to get their grab and go bags from the Nana's Kids program. We are currently, actively seeking support for that program.
Monika:
How else can we find out about what you're doing and where you need help?
Je'net:
Well, on that note, on April 22nd, there was already a planned Help Them Home campaign. It’s a Giving Tuesday but this is only for homeless shelters. Every year we get to do this, and it just happens to fall this month on April 22. On that day we have a matching grant for $25,000. Every penny that you give on that day will be doubled, which is a great way to give on April 22. You can get involved in that by following our social media.
Another way that people can help if they're local to us is by doing their own food drives. We normally get a lot of our food from the food bank. Since everybody is buying all the food in the stores; the food that normally gets donated to the food bank isn't forthcoming. We must do a lot of our purchasing in wholesale markets. In a lot of those situations, there are limits. I need 20 cases of single individual packets of oatmeal every single month and I can't buy 20 of them right now because I'm only allowed two. So if everybody did a little and you can put two of those in your grocery cart when you go to Costco or something and drop it off at our donation site in Garden Grove or our admin office in Santa Ana, that would be enormous for us.
Monika:
Je'net, we were talking offline right before the interview, and you said, "I have to say the last four weeks have been really tough." Can you tell us a little bit more about what you've seen and what you've had to deal with?
Je'net:
Well as you can imagine, nobody had a plan for this. The government didn't have a plan for this. We didn't have a plan for anything that looked like this. It wasn't in our manual for emergency response, which was more around preparing for an earthquake or a fire, or those kinds of things that happen. But we never saw this coming. Myself, my COO, and my director of housing worked those first 13 days, I think all three of us put in a 15-hour day for 13 days straight and really got to the breaking point. We reached exhaustion. I ended up in the hospital for an EKG because I put myself that far into an exhaustion mode that I really thought that I was having a heart attack. That wasn't what it was. I came out just clean as a whistle from that, but I was completely stressed out and exhausted.
And I think that between that and the worry, I see the rest of our staff like also just kind of taking that home with them every day. They're working with people every day that are scared and traumatized, and they take that on every day and wear it for them. And then they must go home to their families and be present and be a part of the community; being a part of essential services, you must go out and go to work or people die. I can't compare this to the medical field because those people are such incredible saints because everybody that comes in the door is a threat. In our situation, not everybody that comes in the door is that kind of a threat. They're not necessarily sick. But they are needy, and they have been exposed to the outside world, and we don't know how careful they're being. So, my staff, they're heroes to me. Every single one of them.
Monika:
As the leader going through it, you're on the ground, you're on the front lines right along with them. This is an unknown, like you said. We've never been through this before. What was going through your mind, and what did you say to your staff about how you were going to deal with this every single day for who knows how long?
Je'net:
Well, the first thing that we did was an anonymous check-in with our staff. We asked them how they feel, like if they had a preference to go to work, what would that look like? And we tried to accommodate as many people as we could with their requests. Initially it was 50% of my staff. They didn't want to come to work. They wanted to work remotely. And that works for some, but not for most. But within the next week we saw almost every single person who had opted for remote work to come back into work. I think they prayed about it, thought about it, felt called. You don't get into nonprofit work and social work unless you're called to it and have a purpose. You know, we are a faith-based organization.
We lean on each other; we lean on a higher power, no matter what that is for everybody. We are filled with hope every day and encourage one another. Every day we do a little update, talk to our staff, add a little something encouraging into that messaging and play a little fun with it. We do little videos with our staff that'll pop in for a moment. Zoom has been incredible as a new resource for us to be able to see people versus talk to them on the phone. It is giving a kind of connection that working on the phone doesn't really do for us. I'm grateful that the system exists and that it's HIPAA protected so we can use it. That's been a blessing.
Monika:
You're an incredible woman, incredible force, leader, hero to so many. I'm sure that not only the people that work with you and for you, but even the ones that you're helping are looking to you right now for that leadership, and you are just doing an incredible job. I know you've been saving lives for a long time and now more than ever they need you, and we thank you for that Je'net.
Je'net:
Thank you. I'm humbled to go to work every day and honored. I always say it's not what happens to you in life that defines you, but how you respond to it. And I try to live that every day.
Monika:
It sounds like the program that needs the most funding at the moment is the food program. Is that correct?
Je'net:
Both the Nana's Kids program and support for the isolation services we need to provide for housing.
Monika:
Where can people find you to help you with those programs?
Je'net:
www.grandmashouseofhope.org