Tim Sarrantonio 0:06 All right, everyone. We're gonna let things go a little bit. But I see at least some attendees. So we know it's working. My name is Tim Sarrantonio, director of corporate brand here at NEON one. I'm excited for today's interview and discussion, Alex, I guess we can call it that. It's, it's, it's a bit of a, you know, its own artistic endeavor. Unknown Speaker 0:34 That's creative in its own way. Tim Sarrantonio 0:38 So we'll start up in maybe, you know, another minute or two. And I'll kind of go over the base housekeeping items. But I am excited for our third session that's been focused on storytelling in the month of August. So if you haven't seen any of the previous presentations that have happened, this is our three of four. The first one was with an interview of creatives from outside the nonprofit sector giving their perspectives on, what is it to be creative? And how do we tell a good story. And then that led to being your authentic self, which then led to our second session, which we had last week, where we talked about being honest. And then what came out of that was the importance of collaboration. And that's what we're gonna be getting into, in about a minute. For now, some housekeeping items before we shift into the formal presentation. Number one, because we had a good amount of registrations, but it is the dog days of summer, Alex. So I'm never worried about live other than making sure that our guests are included in the conversation. So we are recording this. I am going to encourage though, because you can do it to use the chat. So let's test that out. Right now. You have the option for hosts and panelists. If you want to make sure that everybody sees what you post, just choose the drop down that says everybody type in who you are and where we're talking to you from today. Alex, where are you to kind of help us get started on that. Unknown Speaker 2:16 I am in Rock Hill, South Carolina. So for those that don't know, we're about, I'd say 25 minutes south of Charlotte, North Carolina. So right at the border line, Tim Sarrantonio 2:26 right at the border. Awesome. Well, please type in where we're talking to you from we got rich from St. Paul, Minnesota, for instance. So welcome, Rick. We have everyone. Okay. Talofa. Hello, everyone. Oh, hello. Awesome. So very cool. Looks like we got lots of different folks from everywhere. So I'm speaking from upstate New York. Thank you, Rick and others who have said, Hello, the chat is working. So feel free to use that if you have any thing to say there is also a queue and a feature. If you want to make sure that Alex or I see something, then q&a is actually the best way to do that, because it kind of props it up for us to see. We'll pay attention to the chat. But let's go ahead and get started in our presentation today. Awesome. Okay. Very cool. And can we got Washington so we got coast to coast here, Alex, you got coast to coast. So today we're gonna be getting into our topic, entitled humanizing homelessness, how pathways Community Center Created an immersive impact story. So the context of this is we're trying to do storytelling, but a lot of times people think it's like, Oh, I'm just gonna write a good letter, right? Or maybe I'll make a video. And there's such a bigger world, to what storytelling can look like. And that's why I'm excited to have Alex here. So, Alex, please introduce yourself to our audience. And then talk a little bit about pathways community center in particular. Unknown Speaker 4:07 Well, welcome everybody. My name is Alex Greenwald. I'm the executive director at pathways Community Center. And I am just so excited to share one little thing that was what we call mustard seed that was planted with storytelling on our end, that I think you'll be able to take back to your community and plant your seeds and grow something big that we did here in Rock Hill, South Carolina. And so for those that don't know what pathways Community Center is we are a nonprofit. So essentially an umbrella organization where we how 17 nonprofits together coming to tackle the poverty and homelessness sectors within our community to ensure that everybody has access to resources, and that they don't have any forms of transportation barriers and And that is why we're all housed under one roof. So it's essentially a one stop shop. And when you think about being homeless and putting yourselves in somebody else's shoes, or you're just struggling to make ends meet is it's very hard to navigate services and programs and resources near and far throughout your cities in town. So we are a equitable solution, creating access and eliminating those barriers at pathways. Tim Sarrantonio 5:28 Awesome. And how long have you been with pathway so Unknown Speaker 5:31 I finally come up on my year here at pathways, and I bring some background experience in the behavioral health world. So dealing with individuals with the substance use disorder, the mental health side, and as we know, now more than ever, everything is so co occurring inter inter lapped. And when we talk about the population we serve not at pathways, poverty, it could be any one of us, that falls into just some hard times. And so it's good to know all backgrounds and bringing in an open heart with empathy and understanding mental health is huge. Tim Sarrantonio 6:09 And how big is your organization? I know that you work as as many different organizations underneath you. But how about your staff directly as a lot of folks that are doing this, how many how many other folks are working with you, Unknown Speaker 6:23 we are a lean mean machine. So I actually only have two intake specialists. And it's actually a brilliant solution. And concept, we have minimal expenses, because we're bringing in the local nonprofits in the community to be kind of housed at our, our hub, our centralized location. So my staff are going to do intake and really assess the individual's needs and help refer and do a warm handoff down the hallway to all those providers that can help fill those needs. So to staff and we run the show. Tim Sarrantonio 6:58 Wow. So when you're trying to get the word out, what this before we talk about the current project that you've done, what were you doing beforehand to kind of, as an organization, be in the community, talk to folks connect with folks? You know, I know you've been there about a year. So what were you aware of what has been done, and then also talk a little bit about how the pandemic maze may have changed things too. But what's it been like before you started this exhibit? Unknown Speaker 7:31 So pathways, we are three years young, I like to say so we are still learning every day and growing from it. But a lot of community awareness about these resources, and the providers here at pathways was really through social media, and print materials like brochures, but because we're such a unique solution that you don't quite see and a lot of communities, there was still a lack of understanding of who and what we were, and who are the people we're serving. In our community three years ago, homelessness and poverty didn't look like what it does today. And I think there's a lot of misconceptions around the people that were coming accessing our services. From the outside, we heard things like junkies, bombs, low lives, just stigmatizing language that are slapped on, to these humans, and to these mothers and grandparents, brothers and sisters. And so before we saw a lot of that, and as you'll hear when we start to talk about the stories moving forward, how we're changing that narrative, I think it's helpful to know what is the community know that's going on? And, and how are we going to change their heart and mindset. Tim Sarrantonio 8:52 It's so interesting to think so deeply, in some ways about like, just categories and labels that people use. You know, we like to group things. So it makes more sense to us but but definitely the language and the ways that we think about groups of people heavily influenced that so so words matter a lot. Unknown Speaker 9:14 And ethically telling the stories the right way from how they would want it to be portrayed. And those people that were coming through our doors once again, those that was somebody's loved one, it wasn't a bomb, a junkie, an addict. And in fact, it could have been Alex Green a lot walking through those doors just because I've maybe lost my job or went through a divorce, just some hard times. And that's the reality of what we see every day at pathways. Tim Sarrantonio 9:40 So let's talk about the project at hand then. Maybe we could start with like, define and tell us a bit about what we're talking about here. And then we'll find the pathway to how you got there. But But what are we talking about when we when we even use the term you know, human Using homelessness, Unknown Speaker 10:02 human humanizing homelessness really comes down to exactly that getting people to understand and break through the stigma that they believe in. And really getting to the heart of these humans, people that once again are just down on hard times. And in our world when it comes to getting people to invest into our cause, whether that's monetarily volunteering their time, or doing philanthropy in the community, it starts with telling the stories and getting them to understand who is it that they have the chance to change somebody's lives. And that really is what humanizing homelessness was intended to do, getting people to connect with those we serve every single day. Tim Sarrantonio 10:45 So what is the actual project itself? Like, like when you said, we're going to make humanizing homelessness a real thing? What do people actually experience when they do that? Unknown Speaker 10:57 So this was a long project in the works, it definitely took a good four months. And I'll kind of walk you through those steps in a little bit. But the overall experience or the idea behind this was to bring immersiveness, not just a picture on the wall, not just a piece of art, or words, it was really to touch, feel, see and experience as if you're going to put yourself in the shoes of someone that's homeless, and walk through a day in the life of them. And that's really the idea behind humanizing homelessness in an immersive social art exhibit. And that was our unique way of storytelling that gets away from the videos, even though that's incorporated into it. It gets away from your mundane day to day stuff that you will see with a lot of fundraiser efforts or marketing efforts. We wanted people to feel something and they sure did. Tim Sarrantonio 11:57 So why aren't though, like, why why this physical medium, we have a great question that Andrew asked to about the creation process. But who, where did even the genesis of we're going to find like a space and we're going to do like all this this visual medium stuff and tell this story like, like, where did that like how long did that even take? So Unknown Speaker 12:24 it once again took four months. But it started with a brainstorming sessions and basically saying, what is it we want people to feel? And do we want people to feel empathy. And we want people to do something about the issues that we're posing to them and give them some ways that they can do something, whether that's monetarily give volunteer, or do some type of project in the community. So we knew that's what we wanted to do. So we had a big brain session, you know, sticky notes all over the walls. And we went from an idea of like a coffee book table or coffee table book, to share stories out of and we said no, that's not enough. We thought about getting our clients to showcase their artwork. And we said, well, that's, that's important, because it's coming from them. And we can incorporate that element, but it's still not enough. And we know that art can be in so many different forms. And so we couldn't really make our mind up on one thing. We said, why don't we incorporate sound, let's incorporate touch, let's incorporate kind of a immersive experience in a section of the exhibit where you just feel indulged and surrounded by a certain element that we wanted people to feel and and I'll share how we did that specific element that was one of the most moving pieces. We wanted people to think and move through. So moving their body just kind of move through like a museum, but hands on. So think about like discovery place for kids. We wanted to do that. But incorporate the empathy elements. Tim Sarrantonio 14:11 How many? I mean, that sounds like a lot. So tell me about the team that you gathered to actually start to do this. And then I'm going to bring up a great question that Andrew said in terms of the ethical design and involvement of your your homelessness population as well. So Unknown Speaker 14:29 well, there's hope. If you don't have a big team like myself, I've got two intake specialists and a business manager. We have a very small team, we actually got a intern from one of the local high schools. So think about our next generation that can change this world. We we pulled in a high school senior that was doing a project and needed some experience in the real world. And we got so lucky. Her name was Sidney spear. ers. And she really was the brainchild behind this idea. And when I say the mover and shaker when we would brainstorm and plan, she would help move things behind the scenes here. So between her myself and then our marketing consultant Tavian page with a sense solutions, he already knew our community, he knew the people that would most likely attend and benefit from attending. So he was game changer in the planning process of it. And like I said, it started with about two months of just brainstorming and bringing some paper and a pen, little pieces alive. And I would say the last two months leading up to the enrollment of the exhibit. It was then getting the tangible pieces together the art, collecting the stories and making sure all these elements were done ethically and appropriately. Tim Sarrantonio 15:55 So I definitely want to hear about the design process. But I have a very practical question. Yeah. There's ideas. And then there's execution, execution costs, time, talent and treasure, as well. Right. There's expenditures there. How did you fund it? How did you fund the project. Unknown Speaker 16:16 So we have pathways Community Center are opening our doors every day to host tours and showcase the life changing work that happens here. And we knew some really good partners in the community that we felt like this would be something they want to be a part of, and these are corporate partners. So they do have the financial capability to sponsor things. So for us, we partnered with founders, founders Trust Bank, and they were able to help support this cause and do a $10,000 sponsorship. So just that one sponsorship, covered our cost, we knew what we could put into bringing this exhibit alive. And we we said we had to be below $10,000. So that one sponsorship just helped us break even. But then we found out another sponsor, Carolina blood and cancer care associates really love this idea. And said, I want to be a part of it, too. So now we just made money off of the exhibit and hadn't even opened it up to the community yet. And keep in mind that this exhibit was never intended to be a moneymaker. In fact, we almost feel like it would be unethical to have it be intended for a fundraiser. It truly was for community awareness. And we knew through that would come the volunteer the community projects and the funds. But that wasn't the initial idea. So that's where we got the money behind it to get us going. And then the ones that actually we're going to execute it, you know, it was me, the intern in the marketing consultant. And it feels like a lot. But once again, going through Project Management, baby steps, there's templates out there to kind of walk you through to get to the execution phase. But if I can be vulnerable and real for a moment, I think the week before, we're all in that just moment of oh my gosh, it's coming alive. Here we go. Like, are we ready to go from this to that, so it does feel like a lot. But there's hope that you can do this, given that I'm a small team at a nonprofit. Tim Sarrantonio 18:23 I think that's beautiful. And and I think it's important to address and say that type of thing, too, because more often than not, when we hear stories, especially in the nonprofit space, it's like Charity Water, and they just nailed it. And it's like 97% of the sector is not that at all, like Unknown Speaker 18:46 big, don't have the resources, the capacity. Yeah. I Tim Sarrantonio 18:51 can't call up George Clooney. And like, have that sprinkled on my nonprofit, the vast majority of people cannot. But like Bill Gates, Unknown Speaker 18:59 yeah, we don't have those resources in our pocket. But we've got a brain, we've got a heart and we've got some good people to bring it alive. Tim Sarrantonio 19:06 So let's talk about how you brought it alive. Because one of the great questions that we got from Andrew is, how do you ensure that you're sharing the stories of homeless ethically rather than creating a spectacle out of their story? And I want to frame it specifically as he did the question. So Alex, let's actually start there because you had your team but you also had your community to to lead into So talk about that. I think Unknown Speaker 19:36 what first comes to mind when we think about the spectacle that we did not want to do, going in with the intent that you're doing something to raise awareness and not money. That is an element that can keep you away from spectacle and stay focused on the storytelling piece. But also, we incorporated our club clients throughout the entire process. So our clients are the homeless individuals. And there were four elements to this immersive exhibit that we wanted to tackle. And the first one was breaking stigmas. So the first part of our exhibit was actually cardboard signs all created by our homeless from the shelter. So the men, the women and the family shelter, we gave them some cut up cardboard, and we said, what do you wish the community knew about you? Or how did you end up here, like, tell your story. So right off the bat, there, you're incorporating those ethical elements that I don't have to tell their story and assume how somebody ended up in my shelter here at pathways, they get that narrative and that voice. And so if we get chance, I'll show pictures or link a video at the end of this webinar. So you can see these cardboard signs, the one that comes to mind was, wife has cancer, ended up passing away, and I'm stuck with my two boys. And I lost my house after paying medical bills, lost my job, because I had to take care of my wife, and things just all spiraled and ended up here at the shelter. And this is kind of the reality of a lot of the signs that we saw, we saw many people were rooted in their faith, rooted in their own confidence that they could get through it. So that was such an important part of the exhibit in that element. Then as we move to the next section, or phase of the exhibit, this one was going to this one was intended to be breaking those stigmas and now understanding the realities of what's happening local through statistics. So we know statistics are a little bit boring. But you have to remember, our audience of people that were coming to toward this exhibit was the community at large it was healthcare, corporate law enforcement, churchgoers, your local citizens who don't work in this field that I do every single day. All they know is that they see somebody pan handling at the corner of the road every single day, but they don't know the why behind it. So ours kind of helped create the statistics of how many people are currently here in our community that are unsheltered, living in the streets in the woods, and abandoned houses, how many are in the shelters, and what is causing it. So we had some policymakers that actually came through and that was a key element we wanted to make sure came through so that we could shape advocacy efforts. And in that statistics, we're able to say, the lack of well, I guess, the rising inflation, minimum wage just isn't enough to have a livable wage in our community does not have enough affordable housing. Those three factors is what is causing homelessness here in our community. So it gives people the understanding behind the why, why is that person panhandling out on the street? And what were those signs beforehand that helped break your thought process and stigmas. So then as we moved into the third element, this was storytelling at its finest. And this was where we actually have which my friends are here behind me. We had five to six clients that we interviewed all at different phases of their journey here at pathways, some that were in the beginning phase of homelessness, and some that were about to transition out and get their own home and be up on their own two feet. And how we did it was we sat them down in a room and said, you know, if you want to share your story, it's worth being told. We knew some of these individuals, you know, specifically their stories that they had gone through, and helping to show it could have been any one of us, and making sure we had representation from our demographics, ages, race, gender. And so those that wanted to share their story, which believe it or not, once the first one did, and they started to see their own peers were getting in front of the camera, it was pretty easy for us to get clients to say hey, I'm next like, please, I have a story I want to share. So the ones we captured, there really was Unknown Speaker 24:32 there is no narrative we gave them we just kind of opened it up with share your story, you know, why are you here? And what do you wish the community would know? And so through that we make QR codes and the exhibit and that's where you're able to hear these voices cry with these individuals smile with these individuals because everyone's stories brought a lot of different emotions. Janet behind Here is just a wonderful human being that had a health condition and ended up going blind, and could not take care of herself lost everything and ended up homeless. So imagine being homeless and blind. That was a lot for her to go through. Jason behind me here, he is doing so good, he has transitioned out of our shelters. And his story was kind of showing how he had once been incarcerated and said, I'm going to do something to change my life. And when he showed up here at pathways, he took advantage of all these different resources from jobs counseling, getting an ID just ways to really better yourself, and he shared how he got better. And now Jason comes back as our alumni, and he checks in on the others who may not be doing so well and helps kind of uplift them. So that storytelling piece was probably what I thought would have been the most moving element of it all. But as we move to the next section, this was a 180, visual, immersive component. And we basically went into one of these encampments in our local community in the woods. And we took a 180 panorama picture of what it would be like to live right there in those woods. And then we set up this ground with tents, and what are the basic necessities, you would have to have to live in that tent? And we had a question placed right out front of this portion of the exhibit. And we said, your family has just undergone homelessness, you know, you basically have to make a decision, are you going to keep your family together and sleep in this tent in the woods? Or are you going to separate your family where the father goes to the men's shelter, the mother goes to the women's shelter, and the children goes to the Children's Shelter, because the reality of it is in our community, most people have to separate their families. And so it was interesting to see the community now make a thoughtful decision of what they would do if they were in their shoes. And it was very split 5050 Some people said I'd rather keep my family together versus keeping us broken apart. Other said, I'd rather give my kids the comfort of a bed in a shelter where there's warmth, and there's food, so that they don't have to endure the mental health and those environmental factors. That was one of the most moving pieces of our exhibit, I thought it would be the stories but that right there, really told it all. And then the last part of our exhibit was the call to action. How do we move people from this, oh, my gosh, my heart is broken. Right now, after going through all of this, I feel like I want to do something, I feel like I need to do something. So we actually had little mini cardboard signs that they could write, now that they know what is something that they're going to do. And they stuck their little cardboard sign to the wall. And it basically said, what their call to action would be and most of them wanted to volunteer, some wanted to start a project within their own neighborhood or group. And some wanted to be advocacy and help shape policy for more affordable housing. And at the very end, we had a hygiene station where people could set up and physically make a hygiene bag. And we called it a love bag. And they were able to keep that for themselves or give it to somebody in need. So I hope as I've walked you through those four major components of our exhibit, it showcases all those different elements of making a decision hearing, seeing and feeling, we just kept smell out of it. I think that would have been unethical. But the clients actually Jason Janet did not end up coming. But Jason Rocky, and one other client who was showcasing the exhibit, they were our guest of honor and actually were around when it was open to the public. And it was really neat to see people walk through and say, Oh, my goodness, that's the client over there that I just read their story. And they were able to shake those folks hands and just, you know, celebrate every milestone in their life. Tim Sarrantonio 29:27 So how did you get the word out about this? Because this is very impactful. But where did that start? In terms of of you know, we're talking the four months, part of that it's gonna be it's almost go time, but you gotta get to the go time. So how'd you get the word out? Unknown Speaker 29:45 Well, this brings it back to me on we are huge proponents of neons platform, the CRM Communication Management System, and that's where a bunch of our volunteers and donors and people lie in that database. So we did a lot of digital marketing, we had a few paid ads on Facebook, and I'm saying like $25, you know, $25 got us, I think 15,000 people to view the post, and we created an event page on Facebook. So when you create those event page, if people say that they're going to it, it sends them reminders leading up to the event. So that's very helpful. You get that little phone, Ding notification saying, Hey, Alex, don't forget your you said you would attend the exhibit. And we strategically kept the exhibit opened not just for one day, but for seven days a whole week. And we made sure it was open morning, evening, and or excuse me, morning, afternoon and evening so that we could capture every walk of life before work after work and on the weekends. And we just created some volunteer shifts so that people could cover me, so I don't have to be there. 24/7. But really, the marketing was social media, digital campaigns and reaching our group that had already supported us. But those that hadn't supported us yet, we were able to do sell on Facebook. Tim Sarrantonio 31:13 Wow. I mean, and it's and it's great to think about the entire end to end experience being connected, right? Because you can get it out through the digital ads. But even when they're physically there, you talked about the QR codes to be able to leverage, right. So it's, it's this full continuum, that you're building awareness, down to that that larger community at that call to action, where it's like, I want to do a project I want to volunteer, like it is the perfect encapsulation of that entire connected experience. Unknown Speaker 31:48 It truly is. And I think our number one greatest outcome was we, we instilled that empathy that we hope to achieve. And we had so many people call to action, my emails were flooded with people wanting to volunteer who I'd never met before. And so that means they saw the exhibit, they toured it and they were moved into action. We actually got monetary donation through it. But to this day, it has been close to six months since we did this immersive social art exhibit. And I still get people talking about it. I have churches that have asked if they could take this exhibit and set it up within their church community. I mean, just the ripple effect that continues on from this is it wasn't what we expected. It's more than what we've expected. Tim Sarrantonio 32:38 That's amazing. Well, you had mentioned and I know we didn't rehearse this. So So Grace, folks Grace here. You said you had some photos that you actually wanted to show her a video, actually, I think that would be a good thing we did. While you're queuing that up, I'll do a call out to what Rick had written, which has said, this reminds me of the hope in the shadows calendar by pivot legal dot Oregon, Vancouver, they give out disposable cameras to homeless clients to document their life and community through a contest to select, select winning photos that go into the camera itself, calendar rent, rather, Unknown Speaker 33:15 there's so many different ways. And now I get so many people asking what are you going to do with it now? Like what's next? So with Rick or anyone else with your ideas, you know, this is something that I think we will continue to build upon. It got so much traction, and we've heard from the community through their input that this is something we should showcase next year and show the progress. So all those people that came through there call to action, how much have we improved? How have these clients lives changed? And what are we seeing as progress in our community. And I think that's huge, because people are giving to your cause, because they believe you're going to change somebody's life or a whole population of people. And that's what we do every day at pathways and to be good stewards, doing what we say we're going to do and making sure that our supporters and our donors believe in what we're doing. You want to show them the progress. And so this was the first ripple effect, but we think next year will be that progress point. So Tim, I'll go ahead and share my screen, please. So this is a video to recap and give you a visual of what I've been talking about. Tim Sarrantonio 34:26 Remember, if you have the sound you have to like hit the thing to share the sound during the share settings because I forget that all the time, by the Unknown Speaker 34:36 way. Gotcha. Um, okay. Let me make sure we started early. Make sure Tim Sarrantonio 34:43 then click the Share. The white box will pop up. Look at the bottom quarter. Share, Sam, Unknown Speaker 34:49 you're on it. Tim Sarrantonio 34:50 There you go. See? Now you should be good to go. So please, I'll mute myself just so there's no interference. Perfect. Unknown Speaker 34:57 Common denominator was empathy. We realize like a lot of people just don't know what it's like a day in the life of being in poverty being homeless. So empathy was the field. Then we said, well, what what do we want them to experience, we went through a whiteboard experience of, you know, listing all these different things. And it came down to, we want them to actually move, feel and touch. That was the experience. And we are so blessed our community and just the sponsors on this, this exhibit has really brought everything to life, Unknown Speaker 35:33 the homelessness exhibit today, and for the next week, we'll just be I think eye opener. For everyone that comes in that door, walks down that way, and has to see all the choices that homeless people make. It almost made, you seem as if you were in the shoes of someone homeless, like you are kind of figuring out where you got to sleep at night, or you were figuring out what you were going to eat the next day, are you going to figure out whether you're going to take this money to put it towards gas to get to work or just your medication in general. With me growing up in my community, I've seen a lot of homelessness in the area. And it definitely just makes it feel real, makes you want to get active and makes you just want to help everyone that you honestly can Unknown Speaker 36:16 tonight was an extremely exciting night for us, the people that came politicians, business people, church leaders, so many different people who have supported us. But still, even though they've supported us, they don't really get a total grasp of what homelessness is, I'm not sure that I did is I've worked with pathways, I begin to understand what it means to be homeless and stuff and the plight of people trying to dig their way out of a hole less like being thrown into a deep hole with a shovel and say, Okay, now dig your way out, the hole just gets deeper and deeper and deeper in who we really need is for people to understand the plight of the homeless, then how can I connect with that, to begin to have an impact? This is just a start. It's not just a meal, a handout a coat? A blanket is how can we change policies and processes in our community, in our state, to begin to do the right things to help people be able to find jobs, that are affordable living wages, and be able to find a place to live that they can afford to live in. That's our challenge. Unknown Speaker 37:36 That's beautiful. You should be Tim Sarrantonio 37:39 you should be extraordinarily proud of the work that you've done, Unknown Speaker 37:43 where we're so proud. And I think, you know, seeing that now, I hope it brings to light what we're talking about the elements. And I probably failed to mention, you know the structure of how we built it and the location that we picked, but it was all built through a church group that helped scrape a wood structure. And they actually got some of our clients in the back to help do it and just pay them for their time for for building this construction project. And we chose a location that, luckily was able to be given to us it wasn't really open to the public, it was a very industrial feel. It was a open space with natural light. And we felt like it resembled being under a bridge, which is where many of our own homeless are living. So incorporating those pieces as well. I will say wine, and food was not incorporated the entire time that video. I wish that video represented our opening night with our key donors and partners. But beyond that, we had over 500 people who I've never met in this community come out and to see the parents bring their young children and give them the chance to have a healthy conversation about you know, what they're seeing at that corner with panhandling or the the parents and the the young kids that are living under these bridges and in the woods. It helped create that conversation in the family to let those parents showcase. Know, these are normal people honey, and there's ways we can give back through our capabilities, which is volunteering or creating more of those love bags. And that to me was really exciting to see. Tim Sarrantonio 39:34 Alex, this has been absolutely wonderful. I'm gonna see if we have any questions from the crowd that we have. So folks, this is a good time if you wanted to ask anything to Alex about her experience designing this and her kind of collaborative process. Gratitude to the man mazing work that you do for your community, Unknown Speaker 40:02 thank you so much and same to you guys, you're on this call for the same reason you're doing great work as well. Tim Sarrantonio 40:10 Part of what we're trying to do is also to to inspire people to show that it is possible to do impactful work, you don't have to have millions upon millions of dollars, you need no, you need a sponsor or to to step up with 10,000 bucks, and you're going to be able to make that Unknown Speaker 40:32 idea, but they want a good idea. And I believe everyone on here well, and and I will say to that, because of this six months ago, we're now going into our big fall benefit. And we're incorporating this into that benefit to remind people once again and bring them back to that empathy. And that will be intended for fundraising and giving. And we know that the labor of our fruits that we sowed six months ago will pay off come fall. Tim Sarrantonio 41:03 The story continues, the story continues. So this was so lovely. I want to thank you and pathways for joining us today we will be supporting their organization as a thank you for telling us your story. So thank you again. And Alex, any final words for folks before we we sign off today? Unknown Speaker 41:27 Just remember, everything you do do it with the right intention of good heart and change will come through that whether you're changing someone's lives or trying to get somebody to open up their heart and mind. So keep doing the amazing work you're doing change happens at the local level, it does not happen nationally or state it happens where you're at. And I will share in the chat box before you sign out my email address and pathways website to learn more. Tim Sarrantonio 41:53 Awesome. So I'll also send out to folks, I just want to plaque of what you just said. There you go. That's right. Thank you, Alex for sharing that to also help we're going to be rounding out our storytelling month with our next presentation next week. One week from today. Next Level storytelling tactics for nonprofits this will kind of put a nice bow on the three different sessions that we've had. We have our own Abigail Jarvis joining us to walk us through so it sounds like everybody wants a humanizing homeless Ness exhibit in their city. So you can do it. There you go. Alex, thank you so much again, and folks will we wish you a lovely August end of the the quarters coming up then we're gonna get into that end of the year stuff so we got this we can create some beautiful things so let us know what you do. Thanks again. Alex. Have a great day everyone Unknown Speaker 42:55 and thank you to neon bye guys. Transcribed by https://otter.ai