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MEMO

TO: Members of the Catholic Charities President’s Council

FROM: Msgr. John Enzler

RE: Update

DATE: August 22, 2016

I know it has been a while since our last President’s Council meeting but I promised to send you some information. I also wanted to send this memo which will provide a brief overview of activities at Catholic Charities.

Before I begin, though, let me take a moment to again thank Charles Abell for his service as Chairman of the President’s Council. Charles served in this role since the creation of this group and his loyal commitment to Catholic Charities was evident throughout. Charles led the group from infancy and brought us to the great place we are now with a large, diverse and committed Council.
For those of you who were unable to attend, I had the pleasure to announce our new Chairperson, Dresden Koons. Dresden is a local Washingtonian, she lives in Kenwood, is married to her husband Alex and has three lovely daughters. Dresden graduated from Georgetown Visitation and went on to be Phi Beta Kappa from Duke, She earned an M.A. in English Language and Literature from the University of Maryland. Dresden joined St Andrew’s Episcopal School faculty in 1999 and is now the Dean of Teaching and Learning at Georgetown Day School. And I believe she has completed her PhD from GW in Curriculum and Instruction. Dresden is now the Dean of Teaching and Learning at Georgetown Day School. Dresden and her family have shown a great commitment to the poor. She believes in volunteering and she and her whole family have volunteered at St. Maria’s Meals and the Christmas Dinner. She is a wonderful role model for her children. I am so thrilled that she has agreed to serve in this role for Catholic Charities.

In other news at Catholic Charities, we have two major projects to tell you about.
The first is the Mona Center: This new family center located in Camp Spring, Prince George’s County, will bring much needed services to the community. Catholic Charities will provide Dental Services, Immigration Legal Service, Legal Services, and our Parish Partners Program to start. We are also partnering with Doctor’s Hospital to provide a medical clinic and with the University of Maryland Health Equity Center to provide a wellness center. Our St Maria’s Meal Program has been providing food on Tuesday nights as our entrée into this community but we hope to complete construction and be fully operational by late fall.
The second project is our new Angels’ Watch Shelter. The Angel’s Watch site’s address is the following:
11670 Doolittle Drive
Waldorf, MD 20602

Since 1989, Catholic Charities’ Angel’s Watch Shelter has been a source of safety and new beginnings for women and their children fleeing domestic violence and/or homelessness in Southern Maryland. Located in Charles County and operating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, Angel’s Watch provides case management and a full range of supportive services to assist residents on their path to self-sufficiency. Angel’s Watch allows women to bring all of their children with them, including male children up to 17 years of age. We protect the location and identities of our residents and work one-on-one with them to guide them to an independent life, free of abuse.
Angel’s Watch residents include single women and women with children who are homeless for various reasons, and works to serve traditionally hard-to-reach populations. The program serves people who are experiencing homelessness and have completed rehabilitation programs, are released from incarceration, discharged from area hospital psychiatric units, or have been living on the streets, in cars, or in violent situations. The population served by Angel’s Watch also includes women and their children who are homeless due to economic reasons, wage levels that do not meet the cost of living, and a lack of affordable housing. Specific subpopulations include chronically homeless individuals and families, domestic violence survivors, and persons with chronic substance abuse behaviors.
Serving both survivors of domestic violence and women who are homeless, as well as their children, Angel’s Watch Shelter works to open doors to help and hope for all of our residents. Our ultimate goal is to provide a safe and comfortable home for women and their children to live while receiving services tailored to meet their individual needs for achieving self-sufficiency and stable, permanent housing of their own. Through case management and support services, the women we serve at Angel’s Watch Shelter are able to secure the long-term resources needed to end the cycles of homelessness and chronic poverty, find jobs that pay a living wage, and continue their education.
Angel’s Watch Shelter’s multifaceted, holistic approach connects clients to a full range of additional social services offered on-site, by our community partners, and services provided by the expansive Catholic Charities network. Supportive services complement each other and allow us to assist survivors who face more than one barrier to self-sufficiency.
In addition to telling you about the projects above, I wanted to update you on some other activities here:
Capital Campaign: Catholic Charities successfully completed our campaign, which raised $76M. Thanks to many of you who helped to exceed our goal. This is a great accomplishment but as most of the dollars are designated and we have an annual budget of $90M we still have, and will always have, many needs. To that end, I have hired a new Chief Development Officer, Tara Arras. Many of you may know her from her work at Community Counseling Services or from Holy Trinity. I expect she will be at our next meeting and you will get a chance to meet her then.
Papal Visit Anniversary: Soon we will be celebrating the anniversary of the visit of Pope Francis to Catholic Charities. It is hard to believe it has been that long. I still marvel at the fact that he chose to come to us. What a blessing! Many of you had a chance to see the Papal Fiat at our Gala, but for others of you there may be a chance to see it at your parish or just traveling around town in service to one of our programs. A donor purchased the vehicle and gave it back to us for a year to use in the Archdiocese. So if you see the black Fiat with the plates “DriveWithFrancis” know that it is the Pope’s car and is the messenger for an act of mercy.
Kennedy School: I am pleased to report that we are having some great success at our Kennedy School. With the vision and drive of our new principal, Dr Paris Adon, we have reorganized the school, enrolled a number of new students, and brought in some new staff. So now we are planning for slow growth so we know we can manage appropriately going forward. Those of you, who have been here at President’s Council meeting where we have discussed how to keep the school operational, should be greatly pleased that we can continue to serve and provide excellent services to those who are intellectually challenged and need the type of services only we can provide. I want to thank all of you for your ideas and suggestions.
At our last meeting we didn’t have a chance to talk about programs as our speaker, Charlie Cook from the Cook Political Report was so good, I couldn’t cut off the Q & A. I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did even though I don’t think even he predicted how impossibly bumpy this election process is getting.
So, these are some highlights that I had planned on talking about. If you have any questions, comment or thoughts and ideas, please feel free to call. I love hearing from each of you and getting your guidance and expertise.
I hope you enjoyed your summer. I’m looking forward to seeing you at our next President’s Council meeting in the fall. Stay tuned for the save the date.
[fr-john-informal-signature]
Rev. Msgr. John J. Enzler
President and CEO
Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Washington
Office: (202)- 772- 4329
Fax: (202)-386-7038
John.Enzler@CatholicCharitiesDC.org<mailto:John.Enzler@CatholicCharitiesDC.org>
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