Haley House

CONTACT:

23 Dartmouth Street
Boston, MA 02116
(617) 236 - 8132
www.haleyhouse.org

Kathleen McKenna

DESCRIPTION:

This Project represents an interesting type of Venture Philanthropy in which a successful mature organization raises itself to a higher order and power of productivity through an infusion of capital invested, according to a strategic vision, backed by a sound business plan.

Since its founding, Haley House has successfully evolved from a basement apartment to five buildings in the South End and an organic “Noonday Farm” in Winchendon Springs. It supports a meals program -- soup kitchen, afternoon elder meals, and food pantry; 8 low-income apartments and 24 subsidized dwellings for formerly homeless individuals; a live-in staff internship program; and a bakery with a training program. The farm grows vegetables, eggs and flowers, for free, to low-income families and elders. Haley House has also “adopted” a young adult magazine, Whats Up, to assist its growth and maturation. If you sense entrepreneurship at work, you’re right.

The proposed next step, for which Venture Philanthropy investment is here sought, is to draw all these parts more closely together, into an integrated whole, at a significantly higher level of operation and accomplishment. The key parts to this plan are: 1) to expand The Bakery into a thriving business through significant capital investment, further developing and integrating the Farm, the Bakery, the Meals Program and the Food Pantry operations, to create a combined Bakery and Cafe in Dudley Square; 2) to strengthen and expand the Training Program accordingly, so as to include all three areas of activity and to reach out more assertively among teenagers as trainees; and 3) to add a paid Program Coordinator to the two existing paid positions (Managing Editor and Vendor Outreach Coordinator) in order to increase funding and manage volunteers. The Bakery, Whats Up and its housing service run as profit-making businesses, furnishing income streams for Haley House as a whole.

All programs reflect a commitment to the principle that everyone has a right to be treated with dignity, offered real challenges, and afforded the opportunity to achieve their full potential. The organic farm, Soup Kitchen, and housing facilities are run as businesses to provide real jobs and on-the-job training in all aspects of business operations. As Haley House continues to grow, its operations become increasingly sophisticated, and its constituencies, diversified. Integrating it all into a philanthropic framework is the basic challenge. There is a vision at work here that is highly exceptional, highly realistic, and highly skilled -- philanthropic leadership at its best.

(2000: HUMAN SERVICES: Well-Being)