With sincere apologies for such short notice: please send messages of support for Marian Residence, a shelter and transitional housing program for homeless women in San Francisco, to SF mayor’s office, if possible in advance of press conference on Wednesday, August 20, at 11 a.m. (and please copy messages to <amosjj@redjellyfish.net> for purposes of a tally).
For more information about Marian Residence, see “St. Anthony’s to Close S.F.’s Marian Residence” (Marisa Lagos, San Francisco Chronicle, 10 June 2008), which reminds the reader that “There is a dearth of shelters for women, and many beds at coed facilities are unsafe.”
Help Keep the Marian Residence for Women Open
Dear Friends of Marian Residence for Women,
Please help prevent the closing of the Marian by sending a short email or letter to Mayor Newsom asking him to stop the August 31 closure of the Marian Residence for Women,
AND
by joining us on Wednesday, August 20 at 11 am on the steps of City Hall, Polk Street side for a Press Conference.
Below are some key points that you could include in your own letter, or a sample letter you could copy, sign and send. We need a critical mass of letters sent to the Mayor IMMEDIATELY, and it’s best if letters are written in your own words with your own special touch.
Please email the Mayor’s office via the website <www.ci.sf.ca.us/site/mayor-index.asap?id=22018>, email him direct at <gavin.newsom@sfgov.org>, or fax a letter to the office at (415) 554-6474.
KEY POINTS FOR MRW:
- We are urging the Mayor to allocate discretionary funding to keep the Marian Residence open until grants and other support can be secured.
- Closing the Marian Residence will cost the City much more because these women and others will live on the streets and require emergency services and hospitalizations.
SAMPLE LETTER:
Hon. Mayor Gavin Newsom
City Hall
City and County of San Francisco
San Francisco, CA 94102
Dear Honorable Mayor Gavin Newsom,
The Marian Residence for Women is a shelter and transitional housing program for homeless women in San Francisco. It is home for 60 women on any given night and houses over 350 women each year.
Despite the program’s remarkable success in caring for this underserved population, St. Anthony Foundation has decided to close down the Marian and to rent the building to the City of San Francisco. This is a devastating and cold-hearted decision that will put homeless women in San Francisco back onto the streets or force them to live in unstable and unsafe situations.
While the City has promised to find permanent housing for every resident of Marian who is to be displaced by the closure, many Marian women have instead been dispersed to shelters or left to face the closure with no option but the streets.
We urge you to keep Marian Residence open until funding can be secured to maintain this program. Please do not abandon homeless women or this unique and successful program.
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