Help Page:

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Use this page to donate, or find a help group.  There is a page listing only the best, at All Stars.  This page is being revised see Web Ratings.    Click purple to Go.

• Salvation Army.  Most famous of traditional charities for the poor, but has accumulated a huge bureaucracy that costs a lot to maintain.  Very little help in the form of food has gotten thru lately, mostly just people with an agenda of prosyletizing.  Good charity, but overrated.
• American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).  Not often thought of as a charity, but does more to help the homeless situation than all other charities combined.
• United Methodist Churches.  Some offer very good programs, with medical care, meals, dental, and more.  Most do not.  This group has the most leeway of good-to-bad within one religion, so contribute to a specific church, and not the national organization.
• Evangelical Lutheran Churches in America.  Many have good help programs such as Project Hand, a food pantry, and a few even have meals for poor people.  Once again, some churches very good, and others bad, so contribute to a specific church, and not the group.
• Roman Catholic Churches.  The Jesuits operate Father Joe´s Villages, which is one of the most important sources of help for the homeless.  Individual churches sometimes get involved with the poor, but usually not.
• Alpha Project.  One of the other success stories of help that really works, Alpha operates Neil Good day center for homeless adults in San Diego.  Good organization.  See the President´s Statement, below.
• San Diego Rescue Mission.  Lots of help, but at a price of requiring continuous religious participation.  These are people with an agenda to force control.
• God´s Extended Hands.  Agenda of forcing control and religious belief upon people who know better.  Overuse of gnosis, causing victimization at same.
• So Others May Eat.  Tiny local non-profit that obtains donations (mostly food) and puts on lavish meals using volunteer chefs from local restaurants.  Homeless night out at the fancy restaurant.  Nice touch.
• Ladle Fellowship.  More a source of companionship than food, this Presbyterian program feeds weekly.
• Democratic National Committee.  Political help for a country that badly needs it, the homeless and povery being entirely a political creation of the Bush years.
• This Website?  www.NZ9F.com is actually owned by San Diego homeless as a public service (below).

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Alpha Project President´s Statement (from website):

For generations we have been told to help the homeless by giving them food and shelter. Our ideas of homelessness invoke pictures of bag ladies and old bearded men standing in line at soup kitchens or waiting for shelter in a community gymnasium. Some charities will still tell you that this is still the face of homelessness. Not Alpha Project.

Since 1986 Alpha Project has been proving the skeptics wrong. Alpha Project has shown that with opportunities and support, homeless people can become community assets, rather than liabilities. By offering the homeless opportunities as not handouts, respect as not pity, and empowerment - not control, our programs enable the homeless to end their cycle of dependence and regain the dignity and self-sufficiency to which we are all entitled. Alpha Project believes that people can and will change their own lives, provided they are expected to do so and given the tools they need to meet that expectation.

I hope you take the time to review this site and find out who we are, and more importantly who we are not. We own over 700 units of quality affordable housing for families and seniors as we do not own slums. We prepare and serve over 500 meals each day to participants in structured, community-based programs as we do not run soup kitchens. We offer 120 state-licensed residential drug and alcohol treatment beds as we do not run halfway houses. We distribute over $100,000 of donated gifts each year to those in need as we do not run thrift stores to line our own pockets. We are an asset to our community as we are not a place to get a handout.

Numbers tell a part of the story. Every day Alpha Project's programs serve thousands of homeless persons. Annually over 24,000 different men, women, and children access one or more of our services. We serve communities from Riverside to Chula Vista and every city in between.

But numbers fall far short of telling the whole story. The happy tear in a mother's eye can only tell the story of our success as she and her children spend their first night in their own apartment. The measure of our impact goes beyond statistics as our impact is measured in human terms, and in terms of our service to the entire community.

The following pages will outline in more detail our many programs and services. I urge you to look thoroughly at our programs and to contact us with any questions you may have so you can find out for yourself what makes the Alpha Project the place "where miracles happen."

Continued blessings,

Bob McElroy
President/CEO

www.AlphaProject.org

Web Links and Photos Below Right:

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