On Thursday, February 18th the Asheville-Buncombe Homeless Initiative hosted a Faith Summit, entitled “From Sandwiches to Solutions,” of local religious groups to address the issues of homelessness and how the religious groups could respond in kind.
Held in the YMI Cultural Center on Eagle St. the summit was broken into Presentations and Breakout groups. Presentations were made by Amy Sawyer of the Homeless Initiative on the current state and guiding paradigms of solving the problem of homelessness, Carol Jones, the Faith-Based Liaison for the Deptartment of Housing and Urban Development on HUD Partnerships and Funding, and Roberta Macauley of the Support Circle Program based in Raleigh on best practices. Other speakers included David Nash from the Asheville Housing Authority and Cecil Bothwell of the Asheville City Council.
After lunch, during which the faith organizations could visit tables with representatives from 11 local service providers, the summit broke into workshop groups which allowed the groups to develop specific plans of action.
Eighteen faith organizations attended. Speaker contacts and the Summit’s agenda can be found at the Homeless Initiative website http://www.asheville.gov/homeless. For more information contact Emily Ball at eball@ashevillenc.gov or 828.259.5733.
