Annual Report 2010

Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Housing Works
Mission Statement
-
Housing Works is a healing community
of people living with and affected by
HIV/AIDS. Our mission is to end the dual
crises of homelessness and AIDS through
relentless advocacy, the provision of
lifesaving services, and entrepreneurial
businesses that sustain our efforts.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 2
“…Relentless Advocacy…”
From the steps of City Hall in Lower Manhattan to the rubble-covered streets
of Port-au-Prince, Housing Works demonstrated its commitment to advocating
on behalf of people living with HIV/AIDS worldwide. Despite the nation’s
troubled economic climate, our clients and staff aggressively lobbied local,
state, national and international leaders to robustly fund and support policies
to end the AIDS epidemic. As always, when leaders wouldn’t listen, we took to
the streets—and, in one spectacular case, the courts—to be sure we were heard.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 3
A Cry for Help
Please! Please! We’re dying! Please do whatever you can to provide some help
down here. Clothes, food, medications, etc. We are in need. Please! Please!
We’re dying.
Edner Boucicaut, one of our long-time contacts in Haiti, sent this e-mail to Housing
Works President and CEO Charles King after the devastating January 12 earthquake that
killed between 250,000 and 300,000 Haitians.
Within days, King and other staffers were on a plane with $30,000 worth of medical and
emergency relief supplies. Within a week, Housing Works physicians, including one
whose parents were killed in the earthquake, had treated scores of injuries and provided
food to 350 households.
That rescue effort kicked off an unprecedented mobilization of Housing Works resources
that has resulted in a comprehensive, long-term commitment to fight for both health care
access and political empowerment for Haitians living with HIV/AIDS.
Housing Works helps Haitian families
access medical care.
Since the earthquake, Housing Works and its partner, the Plateforme Haitienne Des
Associations de PVVIH (PHAP+), a coalition of 13 grassroots Haitian AIDS organizations,
have opened two clinics for HIV-positive Haitians and their families and helped to
re-open one family clinic. Housing Works and PHAP+ have also relentlessly demanded—
at demonstrations and meetings in Washington, D.C., the United Nations and the
International AIDS conference in Vienna—that Haiti develop a comprehensive national
AIDS strategy with input from Haitians living with HIV/AIDS.
Housing Works will not leave Haiti until the rights of HIV-positive Haitians—including
the right to health care—have been secured.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 4
Our Work in Haiti
• In partnership with other New York City-based organizations, Housing Works has
raised $230,000 in relief funds for Haiti, including a MAC AIDS Fund grant of $125,000.
• Housing Works helped launch two clinics where more than 4,000 Haitians have
received medical treatment.
• At the 2010 International AIDS Conference, Housing Works secured a meeting between
Haitian AIDS activist Esther Boucicault, President Bill Clinton and Paul Farmer,
Clinton’s top deputy in Haiti.
• In April 2010, Housing Works and PHAP+ met with members of Congress and the
Obama administration, including U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator Dr. Eric Goosby, to
discuss AIDS in post-earthquake Haiti.
• Housing Works and PHAP+ demonstrated at the Pétionville Club encampment in
Port-au-Prince to demand a Haitian national AIDS strategy and distributed safe sex
information and 38,000 condoms.
• Housing Works opened an advocacy office in Haiti and hired Edner Boucicaut as Haiti
Country Director.
Housing Works helped broker a
breakthrough meeting between Haitian
AIDS activist Esther Boucicault and
President Clinton.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 5
Housing Works’ Haitian Connection
Housing Works has long had Haitian staffers and served Haitian
immigrants. Our involvement with Haiti deepened in 2008, when
we awarded our Keith D. Cylar International AIDS Activist Award to
Esther Boucicault, the first person in Haiti to publicly discuss her
HIV-positive status.
That award led to further collaborations between Boucicault and Housing Works,
including the FEBS Boutik, a for-profit secondhand clothing store based on the Housing
Works Thrift Shops model, and the first gay pride march in Haiti to include people living
openly with HIV/AIDS.
Housing Works had just begun to work with PHAP+ on larger advocacy campaigns when
the January 12 earthquake hit. The earthquake struck, in fact, just as PHAP+, with
support from Housing Works, was meeting with Haiti’s prime minister to address the
misuse of funding from the Global Fund To Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria by its
Haitian fiscal agent.
Cylar Award winner and Haiti Country
Director Edner Boucicaut with Housing
Works cofounders Ginny Shubert and
Charles King.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 6
National Advocacy: Challenging
President Obama’s AIDS Strategy
In 2009, for the first time in the 30-year history of the AIDS epidemic,
a sitting president asked his advisers to create a National HIV/AIDS
Strategy. Housing Works was part of a national effort to provide
community input for this unprecedented and long overdue strategy.
Housing Works staff and clients provided testimony and asked pointed questions related
to housing and AIDS at White House community discussions in Washington, D.C.;
Jackson, Miss.; New York City; and Caguas, Puerto Rico. We sponsored unofficial community discussions in Texas, North Carolina and Michigan. In collaboration with the
National AIDS Housing Coalition, we submitted an extensive report detailing research
that showed the critical link between housing and AIDS treatment and prevention.
Housing Works Pres. and CEO Charles
King expressed in-person his
reservations about President Obama’s
AIDS strategy.
In July 2010, when Obama’s AIDS strategy was released, Housing Works was one of two
AIDS organizations that had the courage to tell the president that the strategy’s goals
were too modest, and, among other flaws, failed to address issues of housing and poverty
and the ballooning AIDS drug access crisis. We received major media attention for our
stance, as well as for (politely) interrupting Obama at a reception celebrating the release
of the strategy.
Other National Advocacy: Highlights
• Housing Works produced the Equality to End AIDS rally, part of the 2009 National
Equality March for LGBT rights.
• Our Mississippi satellite, AIDS Action in Mississippi, hosted the AAIM for Life statewide
advocacy summit.
• Our national grassroots AIDS coalition, the Campaign to End AIDS, held its fifth
anniversary in Washington, D.C., leading to the establishment of new C2EA chapters in
North Carolina, Louisiana, Kentucky, New York and Puerto Rico.
• Housing Works and Puerto Rican AIDS advocates met with members of Congress and
White House staff to ensure that Puerto Rico is included in health care reform.
• Housing Works participated in a groundbreaking housing and AIDS summit hosted by
La Coalicion de Coaliciones pro Personas Sin Hogar de PR, Inc.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 7
New York State and City Advocacy:
Fighting for GENDA, Battling
Budget Cuts
Transgender individuals are disproportionately affected by HIV/AIDS,
and Housing Works has become a leader in the fight for equality for
transgender New Yorkers. In an effort to persuade New York state
legislators to pass the Gender Expression Nondiscrimination Act
(GENDA), Housing Works and Albany transgender activists met with
every member of the State Senate. We participated in two statewide
GENDA advocacy days, bringing people from all over New York to
explain the importance of antidiscrimination protections.
Members of Housing Works’ LGBT Pride
parade contingent, supporting
antidiscrimination protections for
transgender New Yorkers.
Our hard work paid off: GENDA passed in the State Assembly for the third year in a row.
Although GENDA did not pass in the Senate, it received more support than ever, and we
believe that the bill’s passage is within reach. There was another bright spot for transgender New Yorkers: the passage of the Dignity for all Students Act, for which we also
advocated. The Dignity Act is the first New York State legislation to include gender
identity or expression as a protected class of persons.
In New York City, two major initiatives dominated our year. In Fall 2009, we launched
AIDSVote New York City, a candidate and voter education project that held mayoral and
other candidates accountable for their positions on AIDS issues. Housing Works hosted a
community forum for candidates for city comptroller and public advocate, as well as a rally
outside Mayor Bloomberg’s campaign office that highlighted his silence on HIV/AIDS issues.
Much of the rest of the year was taken up fighting Mayor Bloomberg’s attacks on AIDS
services. On Dec. 1, 2009, World AIDS Day, 10 Housing Works clients and staff were
arrested at a civil disobedience action at the mayor’s annual Gracie Mansion bagel
breakfast. In the prior budget season, he had slashed $6 million in funding for AIDS.
Throughout the first half of 2010, Housing Works clients and staff, in collaboration with
other New York City groups, spent countless hours lobbying and demonstrating against
devastating new cuts to the HIV/AIDS Services Administration. We successfully forced the
city to take those cuts off the table after we threatened to sue.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 8
New York State and City Advocacy:
Highlights
• Housing Works convinced the New York State AIDS Advisory Council to pass a resolution
recommending that New York State bring its definition of “HIV illness” up-to-date, an
important step toward expanding eligibility for AIDS housing.
• Housing Works helped obtain the passage of the “30 Percent Rent Cap” bill in the
Senate and Assembly, which would address an unfair rent penalty inflicted on poor
New Yorkers with AIDS.
• We forged new relationships with the People’s Budget Coalition, a key ally in resisting
Mayor Bloomberg’s ongoing attempts to defund AIDS services.
• We forged new relationships with advocates upstate, including Fulton-Montgomery
County, Glen Falls, Saratoga, Syracuse, Schenectady and Utica, to develop an upstate
budget and legislative agenda.
A highway billboard near Albany urging
legislators to change the state’s
definition of HIV-illness, a roadblock
to housing.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Relentless Advocacy 9
Order in the Court
In spring and summer of 2010, Housing Works’ state and city advocacy
teams joined forces with our legal department to defeat Mayor
Bloomberg’s proposed cuts to the HIV/AIDS Services Administration
(HASA). HASA is the gateway to critical supportive services such as cash
assistance, Medicaid and food stamps for 45,000 poor New Yorkers.
Bloomberg proposed cutting 248 HASA case managers, about one-third of the case management staff. “The mayor’s cuts would have gutted HASA’s ability to function,” says Armen
Merjian, Housing Works’ senior staff attorney.
After intensive meetings, protests and attempts to secure a commitment from City
Council to reject the mayor’s cuts were unsuccessful, Housing Works, co-counsel Matthew
Brinckerhoff, the HIV Law Project, and attorney and Housing Works cofounder Virginia
Shubert filed for a temporary restraining order against New York City and New York State.
A federal magistrate judge gave the city 48 hours to decide whether to proceed with the
proposed cuts, prompting the mayor to back down.
Housing Works Senior Staff Attorney
Armen Merjian argued eloquently
against Mayor Bloomberg’s (illegal)
proposed budget cuts.
Those cuts would have been illegal thanks to past Housing Works advocacy and litigation.
The mayor’s proposal would have violated a federal court order that requires HASA to
maintain an overall case manager-to-client ratio of one to 34, as well as New York City’s
own Local Law 49.
Our successful advocacy against cuts that would have unraveled the safety net for poor
New Yorkers living with HIV/AIDS shows both the urgency and the efficacy of our work.
“When the city took the HASA cuts off the table, 45,000 indigent New Yorkers and their
families living with AIDS were able to breathe an enormous sigh of relief,” says Merjian.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Lifesaving Services 10
“…The Provision of Lifesaving Services…”
Since 1990, Housing Works has provided health, housing and supportive
services to more than 25,000 homeless and low-income New Yorkers living
with HIV/AIDS. We pride ourselves on integrating those services—including
permanent and transitional housing, primary care, case management, meals,
nutritional counseling, mental health care, substance abuse treatment,
HIV prevention education, job training and legal assistance—under one
organizational roof. Our 360-degree approach to care is the framework upon
which our healing community is built.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Lifesaving Services 11
Taking an Integrated Approach to Care
This year we made major strides in our ongoing Integrated Care
Initiative, which better integrates Housing Works’ wide array of
client services. When our talented services staff work as a team,
clients have the best possible opportunities for healing.
We completed implementation of our paperless electronic medical records and case
management database system. Through direct access to client medical records and
automated reminders, our staff will be better able to coordinate care and prevent health
problems. In January 2011, the health services staff will distribute report cards to clients,
allowing them to better grasp their progress on key health indicators.
We also reorganized our outreach staff into a new department called Access to Care.
Access to Care has three components.
• E-Access is an online point of entry on Housingworks.org for services. In January 2010,
we brought the respected treatment organization and website AIDS Treatment Data
Network under the Housing Works umbrella. Thanks in part to ATDN’s expertise,
E-Access launched quickly and smoothly.
Clients at our West Village Health
Center on 13th Street in Manhattan.
• The Re-entry Department works with incarcerated or formerly incarcerated New
Yorkers living with HIV/AIDS. The Re-entry program helps clients face the daunting
challenges of life outside, such as family reunification and re-entry into the workforce.
• Medical Case Managers, or MCMs, work in close partnership with our medical care
providers to help clients stay in care and follow their treatment regimens. MCMs play
a vital role: Treatment for HIV/AIDS can be complicated and is made more so by the
multiple challenges our clients face. MCMs also help clients enroll in essential governmental benefits programs.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Lifesaving Services 12
Highlights of Our Integrated Care
Services
• Grant-funded mental health services increased by 19 percent over last year.
• Primary care enrollment grew to 1,200 patients.
• 141 clients enrolled in Housing Works services through E-Access, our new online gateway.
• 107 clients enrolled in our Re-entry program for incarcerated or formerly incarcerated
New Yorkers living with HIV/AIDS.
Our Women’s Health Center provides
a safe space for female clients.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Lifesaving Services 13
The Right Way to Break Out of Prison
Since 2001, Housing Works’ Women’s Transitional Housing Program
has provided housing and access to health care, meals and other
essential services for HIV-positive women released from prison. This
year, we were able to build on that experience to create the Re-entry
division of our Access to Care outreach department.
When inmates are released, they often have nowhere to live and not much of a plan for
readjusting to the outside world. Prisoners with HIV/AIDS are suddenly in charge of their
own health care once they are released. Our Re-entry program offers pre-release discharge planning and post-release access to health care, HIV prevention and support
services. The program targets HIV-positive high-risk minority ex-offenders moving to
New York City.
Housing Works’ Re-entry Program Coordinator Ray Rios and his staff regularly visit
Rikers Island and Otisville Correctional Facility to build relationships with inmates at
least three to six months before they are released. “I always tell people that planning for
re-entry starts the day you’re locked up,” Rios says.
Ernestine Centeno turned her life
around after moving into our Women’s
Transitional Housing residence in
February 2010.
Housing Works also provides referral services, HIV testing and counseling to all prisoners
at risk for HIV. And we stay in contact with clients who re-enter the correctional system
to ensure consistency of care when they are re-released.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Lifesaving Services 14
Aileen Vega: A Mother’s Struggle
and Strength
Drug addiction took everything away from Housing Works client
Aileen Vega—she lost custody of her child and spent 18 months in
prison. But now she has one goal: achieve housing, health and job
stability in order to reunite with her young son.
Thanks to specialists in our Re-entry department, Vega lives in transitional housing
in Brooklyn; engages in harm reduction services, attends support groups and receives
acupuncture at our 130 Crosby St. Harm Reduction Place; receives COBRA case management; and accesses primary care at our Women’s Health Center.
“I love coming to the Women’s Health Center and seeing other mothers with their
children. Someday that will be me. I will get there. I know it’s going to be tough,” said
Vega. “I want my son to be part of the Housing Works family.”
Vega outside the Crosby Street clinic
where she receives harm reduction
services.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 15
“...Entrepreneurial Businesses That
Sustain Our Efforts…”
The recession proved both how essential the social enterprise fundraising
model is to Housing Works and how effective we are at running our social
enterprise businesses. Housing Works Thrift Shops, Housing Works Bookstore
Cafe, The Works Catering, and Gotham Assets earned record profits and
produced over $20 million in sales. Our growth, including the opening of one
new Thrift Shop, the expansion of an existing Thrift Shop, and a burgeoning
wedding event and catering business, allowed us to continue to provide jobs to
Housing Works clients and to educate tens of thousands of customers about
our mission to end the dual crises of AIDS and homelessness.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 16
Housing Works Thrift Shops:
Hell’s Kitchen Makes Ten!
Like other nonprofits, Housing Works faced funding cuts this year as
governments trimmed their budgets. However, the troubled economy also swelled interest in smart bargain shopping. Sales at our
nine Housing Works Thrift Shops, which sell a carefully curated
selection of upscale donated secondhand clothing, furniture and
home furnishings, were so strong that we were able to open a new
store in Hell’s Kitchen and relocate and expand an existing store in
Tribeca. We now have ten locations—nine in Manhattan and one in
Brooklyn—and our online shopping site, Shophousingworks.com.
It was a grand year for our newest
location in Hell’s Kitchen.
In spring 2010, we opened a 25,000-square-foot store in the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood
on 9th Avenue between 49th and 50th streets. The store’s grand opening was hosted by
celebrity stylist and television personality Derek Warburton and attended by a bevy of
New York personalities, including members of the cast of “Real Housewives of New York
City.” Thanks to innovative events such as an auction of dresses by the late Alexander
McQueen and a collaboration with the cast of the Broadway show “Spring Awakening,”
the Hell’s Kitchen store became one of our top earners within three months of opening.
In summer 2009, we relocated our Tribeca Thrift Shop to a gleaming 3,000-square-foot
space at 119 Chambers St. The new location became an instant can’t-miss-it stop among
the famous shopping neighborhood’s stylish boutiques. In its first full year the store
surpassed $1 million in sales.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 17
A Banner Year at Housing Works
Bookstore Cafe
Housing Works Bookstore Cafe continued to expand its peerless
music, literature, comedy, film and food programming. Our eclectic
slate of over 150 events drew scores of attendees and many reached
our 300-person capacity. This ambitious schedule improved cafe
revenues and publicity.
We entered partnerships with Harper’s and Bookforum, both of which presented top
writers such as Mary Gaitskill and Colson Whitehead. The Moth, a popular storytelling
organization, produced a monthly “slam” that consistently brought in over 300 people,
with folks lining up around the block hours in advance. The Bookstore also joined forces
with top websites like Slate.com, Goodreads.com and Tumblr.com for panels, parties,
readings and concerts, all of which sold out.
Twenty happy (now married) couples
rented out the Bookstore Cafe this year.
The year also featured successful one-time benefits. The Black Keys played a concert that
raised $27,000 in one night and sent fans running to their blogs, keeping the buzz going
for months. The show included a pop-up shop that earned a wide array of media coverage,
from sites like BrooklynVegan.com to The Wall Street Journal, and was patronized by
hundreds of fans beyond those who attended the concert.
In May, we presented A Taste of Home, a new foray into high-end culinary events,
featuring world-famous chefs and food personalities, including Gail Simmons. Feedback
was universally positive, and the event will return next year.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 18
Local, Fresh, Seasonal:
The Works Catering
Housing Works added The Works Catering to its roster of social
enterprise businesses back in 1997, but this year The Works entered
an exciting new era: In January 2010, we refocused The Works’
culinary offerings on locally grown, seasonal ingredients and dishes.
This re-imagining of The Works menu paid off: The Works had its
highest-grossing year ever.
A delectable fried egg, one of The
Works’ custom farm-to-table creations.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 19
Weddings with The Works
The Works also played a key role in our effort to expand our weddingrelated services. Thanks to savvy marketing and positive word-ofmouth, the Bookstore Cafe was rented out for 20 wedding receptions
or ceremonies. Most of these couples chose event services from The
Works Catering. Overall, wedding-related services raised $200,000
for Housing Works.
New Yorkers Andrew and Jeremy held
their engagement party at the Housing
Works Bookstore Cafe.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 20
Fashion for Action
Our annual Fashion for Action fundraiser continued to prove why
it is New York’s top charity fashion sample sale.
The sixth installment of Fashion for Action was a four-day event that featured a VIP
opening night gala at Chelsea’s Rubin Museum, a silent auction and three-day sample
sale. Over 150 top designers, including Fashion for Action cochair Derek Lam, donated
more than $1 million worth of merchandise that was then sold at 50 to 70 percent off retail
to raise money for Housing Works. New participating designers and brands included Gilt
Group, Acne, Band of Outsiders, Bottega Veneta, Lanvin and Karl Lagerfeld. Returning
supporters included Bloomingdale’s, Diesel, DKNY Jeans and Polo Ralph Lauren.
“I was honored to be a part of this year’s Fashion for Action,” Lam said. “Housing Works is
a remarkable organization.” With major media coverage and support from celebrity
fashionistas such as host committee member Olivia Palermo, John Bartlett and Erin
Featherston, Fashion for Action raised $350,000.
Fashion for Action host committee
member Olivia Palermo enjoying the
opening benefit gala and shopping.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 21
Design on a Dime
Housing Works’ biggest yearly fundraiser, Design on a Dime, got
even bigger—and better—this year. Working in collaboration with
return sponsors Kmart and Sears and media sponsor Traditional
Home, we increased ticket sales for Design on a Dime’s opening
night benefit at the Metropolitan Pavilion by 50 percent. Overall, the
event raised a record $700,000, which will help fund the building of
Housing Works’ residence for New Yorkers living with HIV/AIDS, the
Jefferson Avenue Housing Program in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn.
Design on a Dime brings together 50 of the world’s top interior designers, who create
unforgettable room vignettes with new, donated merchandise that is then sold for 50 to
70 percent off retail. This year’s star-studded roster of designers included Jaclyn Smith,
Ty Pennington, cochair James Huniford, Jamie Drake, Charlotte Moss, Peter Som and
“Top Design” winner Nathan Thomas.
The remarkable results of Jaclyn
Smith’s makeover of the roof deck of
our Keith D. Cylar House residence in
the East Village.
Smith made Design on a Dime extra special: Two days before the event, she visited one of
our congregate residences, the Keith D. Cylar House, to meet with residents and unveil
her gift to them: a $10,000 renovation to the Cylar House rooftop terrace. Smith spoke at a
moving ceremony and posed for photos with clients, while the New York Daily News and
WABC documented her generosity in the fight against AIDS.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Entrepreneurial Businesses 22
A Decade (or More!) of Volunteering
Housing Works would never have been able to provide lifesaving
services to tens of thousands of New Yorkers living with HIV/AIDS
without our volunteers’ selfless dedication and support. Our volunteers do everything from operating cash registers at our Thrift Shops
to photographing special events to teaching reading, math and other
skills to our clients.
In appreciation of their dedication, Housing Works honored our 10-plus-year volunteers
with a special dinner in April and profiled many of them on our website.
Among those profiled was Bookstore Cafe volunteer Michael Adams. “I still feel the need
to do my part in the fight against AIDS, especially as a tribute to the friends I’ve lost,”
Adams said. “I can look forward each Saturday to a few hours when I know that while I’m
doing a tiny bit of good, I will also learn something, laugh a lot, and feel that we are all
truly appreciated for the time we spend there. I doubt there are many such places that
can compare.”
Connell McMenamin, a volunteer for
nearly 10 years, outside the West
Village Thrift Shop.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Letters & Financials 23
Letter from the President and CEO
This year we celebrated the 20th anniversary of Housing Works. While the nightmarish
years of the early ’90s—before we had life-saving AIDS drugs—are behind us, 2010 was one
of the most harrowing years we have experienced.
The day after the January 12 earthquake, I received an e-mail from Edner Boucicaut, a
long-time Housing Works collaborator in Haiti, where we’ve had a presence since 2008. It
read “Please! Please! We’re dying! Please do whatever you can to provide some help down
here. Clothes, food, medications, etc. We are in need. Please! Please! We’re dying.”
Within three days, we were on the ground in Haiti, delivering $30,000 worth of medications and emergency supplies. Within three weeks, we launched a campaign to open two
medical clinics for Haitians with HIV and reopen a family clinic (all three are going
strong, thanks in part to a $125,000 grant from the MAC AIDS Fund). Within three
months, we organized a campaign demanding that the Haitian and U.S. governments
urgently address Haiti’s ruined AIDS services. In May, we opened a permanent office in
Haiti—run by Edner Boucicaut.
I want to express my deepest thanks to the Housing Works donors, volunteers, customers,
clients and staff who contributed to our efforts in Haiti.
Haiti galvanized us to work even harder to protect and expand AIDS services here in the U.S.
There have been victories and roadblocks. Nationally, Housing Works hastened the repeal
of two long-standing bans—one barring foreigners with HIV from traveling to the U.S,
the other barring funding for needle exchange—while at the same time President Obama
scaled back the nation’s global AIDS commitment. In New York, we staved off the deepest
proposed cuts to AIDS services, but efforts to expand housing assistance remain stalled.
After 20 years, we are used to both progress and frustration. How do we continue to fight,
year after year? Our efforts in Haiti proved, once again, that together, the Housing Works
family can move mountains, if only a little at a time.
Sincerely,
Charles King
Brooklyn, New York
September 28, 2010
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Letters & Financials 24
Letter from the Chairman of the Board
When I wrote my annual letter to you last year, we had just launched our initiative to
improve and grow our primary care services. I’m pleased to report the resounding success
of that effort. As of June 30, 2010, nearly 1,200 clients were enrolled in Housing Works
primary care, up from 450 at the same time last year. Housing Works clients can now
access multiple services such as housing, case management, job training and health care
in a well-coordinated manner, and the advantages are great.
Housing Works is celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2010. It is a perfect opportunity to
launch further improvements in our health services and outreach programs. Accordingly,
this year we undertook the reorganization of our outreach staff into a new department
called Access to Care.
Access to Care includes a new dedicated online point of entry program called E-Access
that can be reached through our website at Housingworks.org. This site allows clients to
enroll in services such as housing, primary care, case management, mental health care
and substance abuse treatment. E-Access will greatly expand our outreach capacity as
well as our ability to efficiently enroll clients.
The Access to Care department also includes a new Re-entry team that supports our
long-standing efforts to help incarcerated or recently incarcerated New Yorkers living
with HIV/AIDS. Re-entry staff aid ex-prisoners in gaining access to health care, housing,
and other services, and assist them in dealing with complex issues such as family
reunification and re-entry into the workforce.
Finally, Access to Care now has a designated staff of Medical Case Managers, or MCMs,
who work in close partnership with our medical care providers to help clients stay in care
and follow their treatment regimens. MCMs play a vital role: Treatment for HIV/AIDS can
be complicated and is made more so by the multiple challenges our clients face.
These are exciting changes. They mean that in this, our 20th year, Housing Works clients
are getting better care than ever. Homeless and low-income New Yorkers face serious
challenges besides HIV, including poverty, mental illness and substance addiction. To end
AIDS and homelessness, we must create a system of coordinated services that empower
and heal our community.
We are well on our way.
Sincerely,
David I. Cohen, M.D., M.Sc.
September 28, 2010
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Letters & Financials 25
Financials: Housing Works Inc. and Subsidiaries statement of activities for the twelve months ending June 30, 2010
REVENUE
Medicaid
EXPENSES
$16,462,378
Program Services
Medicaid - Primary Care
$1,419,394
Housing
Dental
$1,023,968
Healthcare, COBRA, Prevention
Amida Care Revenue
$728,909
Legal/Advocacy
OASAS
$241,940
Business Ventures
Government Contracts
Business Ventures
Development Fundraising
$5,413,795
$17,606,948
$1,655,926
Grants Released From Restriction
$550,000
Apartment Rents
$754,022
Contracted Apartment Rents
$979,302
Property Management
Other Revenue
Cost of Goods
TOTAL REVENUE
Research
Fundraising Services
Administrative Services
Total Expenses
$4,754,764
$19,664,923
$1,690,868
$15,951,518
$30,000
$500,548
$4,874,991
$47,467,612
$1,866,611
$353,290
-$917,692
$48,138,790
Net Surplus / Deficit
Net Assets, End Of Year
$620,154
$35,438,709
For the fiscal year ending June 30, 2010, Housing
Works, Inc. (HWI) and its subsidiaries reported
an unrestricted surplus of $671,000. This was
higher than the budgeted surplus of $537,020 and
was driven largely by considerable savings in
Personnel Services (PS); by better than budgeted
performance by the Thrift Shops and Primary
Care; and by an increase in inventory at the Thrift
Processing Center.
HWI’s cash position during the year remained
tight as of June 30, 2010. While many organizations strive to maintain 45 days of working capital,
HWI ended the year with $535,787 on hand, or five
days of working capital. That number is down
$18,969 from June 30, 2009. The surplus posted
does not include financing obligations and capital
equipment purchases.
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Letters & Financials 26
Financials: Housing Works Inc. and Subsidiaries statement of activities for the twelve months ending June 30, 2010
Legal/Advocacy 4%
Housing Works entrepreneurial ventures produced
over $17 million in revenues for the year. The
surplus generated by these companies subsidized
the opening of an additional Thrift Shop; the
renovation of the client services space at 130 Crosby
Street; the purchase and implementation of an
electronic medical record and case management
system; operations of various Housing Works client
service departments; and much-needed capital
improvements. Of these ventures the Thrift Shops
generated revenues of over $14 million and the
Bookstore Cafe generated revenues of over $2.3
million, increases over the previous year.
Development 1%
Housing 10%
Healthcare, COBRA,
Prevention 41%
Administration 10%
EXPENSES BY DEPARTMENT
Businesses 34%
Development 1%
Housing 10%
REVENUES BY DEPARTMENT
Healthcare, COBRA,
Prevention 47%
Businesses 42%
Housing Works
2010 Annual Report
Letters & Financials 27
Financials: Housing Works Inc. and Subsidiaries statement of activities for the twelve months ending June 30, 2010
Two major events are included in the FY 2010
results: an increase in the value of Thrift Shop
inventory and a reconciliation of bad debt. The
increase in the value of inventory was attributable
to a higher volume of donations, while the reconciliation of bad debt is a result of improved collection
rates for reimbursable services provided through
the Primary Care and AIDS Adult Day Health Care
programs. Finally, fixed assets increased during FY
2010 by $1.2 million as Housing Works continued to
prioritize investment in capital, ranging from
construction projects to technology.
50
TOTAL HOUSING WORKS REVENUE
FISCAL YEARS 1999-2010, IN MILLIONS
40
30
20
10
0
FY99
FY00
FY01
FY02
FY03
FY04
FY05
FY06
FY07
FY08
FY09
FY10