Before She Drove the Hope Coach, She Needed One
Because of your gifts, Case Managers like Andrea meet our neighbors right where they are with water, supplies, and hope.Andrea starts every morning with devotions...
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SHE THOUGHT NO ONE WAS COMING. THEN A HOPE COACH SHOWED UP.
Your gifts put Hope Coach vehicles and Case Managers on the streets every day – reaching neighbors like Heather before it’s too late.Heather had stopped...
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From Ken Brissa, Chief Executive Officer
When summer hits the Valley, our neighbors on the streets face temperatures that can kill.
That reality is what drives Code:Red, and it is why your support matters so much right now.
The men and women on our Street Outreach teams choose to go out into that heat every single day. They load Hope Coach vehicles before sunrise and head to the places most people drive past without a second thought.
A cold bottle of water opens the door, a conversation builds trust, and over time, lives are rescued.
Your support puts those teams on the streets. Thank you for standing with our neighbors when the stakes are highest.
God Bless,
Ken Brissa
Chief Executive Officer
How a Bottle of Water Leads to Rescue
Every rescue often starts with something simple, a bottle of cold water.
Phase 1: Contact
A Case Manager pulls up in a Hope Coach vehicle and hands someone a cold bottle of water. No pressure, no paperwork, just one person meeting another where they are.
Phase 2: Engagement
The Case Manager keeps showing up. Walls come down, trust builds, and a relationship takes shape. Andrea describes neighbors who once wanted nothing to do with her and now greet her by name.
Phase 3: Rescue
When the person is ready, the Case Manager walks alongside them off the streets, into a short- or long-term housing placement that fits where they are in their journey.
Last year, our Street Outreach teams rescued 1,363 neighbors from the streets, a 30.6% increase from the year before. Every bottle your gifts provide is the beginning of that chain.
Before She Drove the Hope Coach, She Needed One
Andrea’s Story
Because of your gifts, Case Managers like Andrea meet our neighbors right where they are with water, supplies, and hope.
Andrea spent years on our streets herself – battling addiction, wondering if she was alive or dreaming. Today she drives a Hope Coach vehicle across the Valley, meeting neighbors where they are and offering what she once needed most: someone who cares.
Andrea starts every morning with devotions alongside our Street Outreach team. Then she loads her Hope Coach vehicle with water, Hope Tote hygiene kits, and sunscreen, and heads out to the streets.
She knows exactly where to look. She heads straight into encampments along the railroad tracks, down to the river bottom, along trails where others won’t walk, and to bus stops where someone has fallen asleep, meeting each person with confidence and compassion.
“Wherever they are is where I meet them,” Andrea says.
She pulls up, introduces herself, offers a bottle of water, and starts a conversation. On a typical day, she spends time connecting with five to ten neighbors, and many of them know her by name.
She Has Been Where They Are
At 21, she survived a violent attack. The trauma led to addiction, and she spent years on the streets, sometimes with no sense of what was real, and no one stopping to help. Four years in prison became the turning point that saved her life.
“Coming out of all of that, I see people out there going through the same things I went through,” she says. “It makes me want to help them and be there.”
That ability to connect, rooted in her own pain, recently helped reach a man who had been on the streets for 14 years.
The Man Who Waited
Andrea met him on a Friday afternoon. He had a huge shopping cart with a wagon tied to the back, piled high with blankets and bags, everything he owned. When she introduced herself, he barely looked up.
“You guys come out here and just type stuff in your computer and take off,” he told her. “I’m really not interested.”
She parked the Hope Coach vehicle, grabbed a water, and sat with him for thirty minutes. She asked if he would be willing to do a phone screening with our Transforming Lives Center. He had tears in his eyes.
He was accepted. Intake was set for Monday.
“I’m going to wait right here,” he said. “I’m not going to move.”
Andrea told him he would not be waiting on the streets. She put him in a hotel for the weekend. He left his cart, his wagon, and everything else by a dumpster, grabbed one backpack, and sobbed the whole ride to the hotel.
Monday morning, she picked him up in a Hope Coach vehicle and personally delivered him to the program. He is still there today, working toward recovery.
“That’s why I do what I do,” Andrea says.
When asked what keeps her going, she remembers what it felt like to be invisible to everyone driving past.
“Just knowing there are people out there going through that right now,” she says, “and me showing up and showing them that they matter, showing them there is a way out – giving them hope.”
Because of you, Andrea will be back out there tomorrow, loading up the Hope Coach vehicle, searching for the next neighbor who needs water, supplies, and someone who refuses to give up on them. That’s what Code:Red looks like on the streets of the Valley.