Small Sums' Wednesdays for the Workforce

 In mid-March, at Small Sums, we sent all our staff home except for two - Executive Director Naomi Sadighi and Assistant Director Sierra Hegstrom.  We did not shut down.

We decided to begin “Wednesdays for the Workforce”, our response to COVID-19, by helping homeless clients hired in jobs that are taking care of sick people and jobs that are going to keep food, medicine and essentials circulating.  

With bare-bones staff taking intense social distancing precautions, Naomi and Sierra are getting essential workers what they need to start important jobs with on-site client meetings scheduled one day a week on Wednesdays. 

Fortunately, we had adequate stock of work shoes, steel-toe boots, black work pants, and bus passes on hand but we will need to begin replenishing soon. We take immense pride in our unique ability to respond quickly and, now more than ever, we get clients outfitted and ready-to-go for their jobs.

With our practical and timely assistance, we are continuing our work providing clients the items they need to get back to work.  We are collaborating with all the Twin Cities Metro shelters and referring partners who are working the front lines helping people who, on top of everything else, have the awful fate of being homeless during this crisis.

In the past month, those that we have helped include a meat packer, a concrete layer, a line cook, a Walmart supply chain specialist, and a machine operator at a medical device company. Typically, we have 11% clients who work in healthcare, 16% who work in factories and warehouses that keep essential supplies available, and 22% who do other crucial service jobs.  

Right now, we all want to not get sick, not make things worse, and find ways to help others. Today, would you help us do this one "small" thing by helping us keep our door open to the homeless workers who are stepping up?

None of us know the timing for when things will get back to the new normal (or what that will look like) but for now, Small Sums will keep doing this practical work on Wednesdays and preparing for the next wave of job recovery which will no doubt include homeless workers who will need our help to take those jobs and begin their journey back to more stable lives. 

 We're going to need your help to do it.