homelessness Archives - StreetSmart Australia

Oct 04

Making-a-Home Grants – Setting People Up For Tenancy Success

By Buttery Community Grants, Grant Impact, Making a Home, News, StreetSmart News

Setting up someone for tenancy success is a vital part of any homeless support service but funding for household items is hard to come by. This is where StreetSmart’s ‘Making-a-Home’ initiative steps in. Read More

Sep 07

Emergency Food Relief Grants Target CALD Communities

By Courtney Rayner Community Grants, COVID-19, Grant Impact

Last week we made four additional food relief grants targeting CALD (Culturally and Linguistically Diverse) communities in lockdown. We know that COVID-19 has seen a huge rise in people seeking support, in particular food, to enable them to try to pay bills and stay housed. Read More

Sep 07

Community Grants Providing Immediate Impact

By Courtney Rayner Community Grants, COVID-19

Our network of Emergency Relief (ER) and Material Aid community organisations provide a crucial safety net for people experiencing a crisis. The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted how critical these organisations are in supporting the health and wellbeing of vulnerable people. To reflect this, our recent Community Grants, made possible through a philanthropic partnership, have focused on providing $80,000 of support for immediate impact. Read More

Sep 01

SmartCare – Rewards and recognition for frontline homeless workers

By Courtney Rayner COVID-19, Grant Impact, SmartCare

In August 2021 we made an additional 11 SmartCare grants.

Frontline homelessness work is very challenging and throughout the pandemic workers have had to care for others first and self, second. Burnout is frequent and impacts the individual and the level of care that can be provided to people experiencing homelessness. Read More

Jul 13

Poverty and Homelessness – The Reality For Too Many Older Women

By Courtney Rayner Homelessness in the news, Older women, Projects StreetSmart

Housing for the Aged Action Group

For many years, frontline workers in regional and metro homelessness services have been seeing increasing numbers of older women seeking support. The 2016 census confirmed this, showing older women, over the age of 55, were the fasting growing cohort of people experiencing homelessness increasing by 31% from 2011 – 2016. We know this trend has accelerated and worsened since 2016, with many services reporting women approaching them for support for the first time in their lives, unfortunately many are turned away due to a limited capacity to help.

May 31

150,000 Meals Delivered, Training and Jobs Secured

By Courtney Rayner COVID-19, SmartMeals, Winter Appeal

Donate to our Winter Appeal here

SmartMeals was launched back in March 2020, responding to food insecurity of vulnerable people, as COVID restrictions hit community meals programs. This week we deliver our 150,000th meal, powered by our generous supporters. Currently we are collaborating with 13 food based social enterprises, in 5 States, to cook 4,000 meals per week, and we want to keep delivering…. Read More

May 19

StreetSmart delivers $40,000 in grants to support Youth Services

By Courtney Rayner COVID-19, Homelessness in the news, Recovery Fund

At the same time as youth services have seen a significant rise in demand due to COVID-19, many smaller independent organisations have seen a fall in fundraising revenue as their community fundraising came to a halt. In line with Youth Homelessness Matters Day in April, the team at StreetSmart raised funds from our supporters to provide funding to youth services and assist young people experiencing the fall out from the pandemic. All six youth programs we supported through our Recovery Fund have seen fundraising income fall over the past 12 months. One organisation lost $1 million of critical fundraising revenue, another had seen revenue drop to $0:

“Our community fundraising income for the 2020 calendar year was zero, missing our target of $85,000 per annum. Our social enterprise income for the 2020 calendar year was also down 50% on our forecasted income.”

Apr 07

Recovery Fund grants target homeless flood victims

By Courtney Rayner Homelessness in the news, Recovery Fund

A few weeks ago, two massive storms converged over eastern Australia dumping more than 40cm of rain in just five days across huge areas along the coastline, and in some cases as much as 80cm. Rivers rose rapidly, some by over 10 metres. Tens of thousands of people were forced to evacuate, and many people have lost their homes, many have lost everything.

The flooding stretches 600 kilometres from Sydney to the Northern Rivers as Fiona Johnson, a hydrologist from the water research centre at UNSW explained, “It’s just the sheer scale of having it from the border all the way down south of Sydney.” In areas that suffered severe bushfires just 12 months ago, the storms have continued and compounded the devastation.

Mar 26

SmartMeals Evolves to Provide Meals. Training. Jobs.

By Courtney Rayner COVID-19, SmartMeals, StreetSmart News

Our original SmartMeals program was established in March 2020 as an emergency response to COVID-19, providing nutritious meals for people impacted by the COVID-19 economic and health crisis, while also keeping vulnerable hospitality workers in jobs. SmartMeals used the under-utilised capacity of local cafes, restaurants and food based social enterprises, devastated by the pandemic, to provide 111,000 ready-made meals for their local overstretched homeless and community groups. Many meals went to feed people, moved rapidly off the streets, accommodated in hotels and motels.

Introducing the evolution of SmartMeals – Meals. Training. Jobs.

All meals will now be made by social enterprises, meaning vital job training, readiness and pathways programs for vulnerable people in a difficult jobs market. Read More

Mar 19

Regular Sleep Is Imperative for a Healthy Future

By Courtney Rayner SleepSafe

Western Sydney Homeless Connect (WSHC)

Today is World Sleep Day and the focus this year is ‘Regular Sleep, Healthy Future.’ This concept – that a good night’s sleep can be life-changing – is the driving force for our SleepSafe initiative with Sheridan Australia. Sleep not only gives the body a physical rest but also improves mental health.

“It is important to remember that sleep is involved with many physiologic systems such as memory consolidation, control of inflammation, hormone regulation, cardiovascular regulation and many other important functions. Reduced sleep duration has been shown to cause impairments in cognitive and executive function, while poor sleep has been associated with poor mental health.” Dr. Lourdes DelRosso.