On March 27, 2023, CSL and the City of Independence, launched Independence TOGETHER. This was the culmination of an idea that started in 2019, and was disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The idea was relatively simple – provide a supported employment program for adults experiencing homelessness. What does that mean? It means we don’t simply tell folks, “go get a job and stop being unstably housed.” Instead, we create a supported environment that helps adults transition towards a life anchored by permanent housing and permanent employment.

In recent years, community conversations, locally and across America, are dominated by the number of homeless individuals on the streets. There are many root causes, but substance abuse, mental health challenges, and skyrocketing rental rates are three reasons that many people are unhoused in our community. Communities can often turn a blind eye to the problem and hope it goes it away, but that rarely works. Most meaningful change processes involve a coach and/or mentor to help guide someone, and that’s the same with a person exiting homelessness.

CSL has the honor of serving 20,000 neighbors every year. Times are very tough right now. We don’t have to look far to see people hurting, struggling, and needing our support. Now, we look to you to help give back!

“A goal without a plan is just a wish.” I couldn’t attribute this quote to a particular author, but its intent is relevant for where CSL is at (and where we’re going). Coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations and entities across the world have been seeking their collective paths forward.

CSL has many goals, but without plans, we can only wish them into existence. In 2022, the CSL Board of Directors began a strategic planning initiative, under the leadership of Board Secretary Beth Silverstein. The process included:

On March 13, 2013, CSL’s Board Chair, Cliff Jones, called me to ask if I would serve as the agency’s next President & Chief Executive Officer (previously titled as Executive Director). CSL, at that time, was 97 years old, but had suffered from lack of consistent leadership. Since 2009, five people had served as Executive Director (or Acting/Interim Executive Director). I started at CSL as the Director of Development in 2010 and served as the Acting Executive Director all of 2012.

I’m so lucky to have fantastic women in my life. I hope you are too. My dad was hugely influential on my science brain, but my mom grounded my heart. She was so good to people. She knew what was important and what wasn’t. We always joked that mom was the “close enough” kind of mom. When we heard “close enough” when she was making dinner, it was time to crash a friend’s house for dinner. Now that I’m an adult, I get it.

Life isn’t to be understood, but it is to be experienced despite your fears. I’ve learned what we can experience and how we respond can derive the make up of who we are. I love to give my finances to the less fortunate. Love to give BIG hugs to someone who needs it. Love to share my knowledge with others who want it. Love to connect and give my time to the forgotten crowd/people who seek it. I love to see a smile, so I give it right back!

Anthony Mondaine loves Independence, and knows he is here to serve. Today he is not only the only person of color on the Independence School District Board; he is the first elected official to an office in the school district. However, if you ask Anthony who he is, he says, “I’m a husband and a father of two children. I’m a founding pastor of a church that is now eight years old. I’m a bridge of hope and help for other people.”

On October 31, 2022, the Kansas City community lost a giant of a man. Named a legacy, Calvin Wainright was known in Kansas City from his days at Don Boscoe, Greater Kansas City LINC, his basketball teams, to his church with his life partner and wife, Cassandra. Calvin knew life in Kansas City. He knew hard times, and he knew good times. He knew and he never stopped reaching down to help someone up, to celebrate and rejoice with you, and to grieve with you.

I’m not sure who said it, or where, but someone remarked, “community is what happens when people behave as if they intentionally belong somewhere.” I think that’s a great way to think about our communities, and to think about the concept of belonging.

For 13 years, I have written scores of articles and letters about the growth and expansion of CSL’s programs and services. You might ask yourself, is CSL only about growing, expanding, and doing more? As we move in CSL’s 107th year in 2023, here’s how I would answer that question…

For Doug and Helen Hatridge, supporting CSL has been part of their lives for the last 30 years. Both of the Hatridges are retired educators, and they know, firsthand, the impact poverty has on young people. So, Doug and Helen have worked to help CSL grow its programs and services to help local kids and families.

National Hispanic Heritage Month is a time to recognize and reflect on the stories of Hispanic peoples in our nation and community. For me, it is a great opportunity to share where I come from and my experiences as a Latina. I was born in Mexico and then moved to El Paso, Texas until I when I was eight years old. I moved to Kansas City, Kansas at age 15. I have lived almost my entire life as a Mexican immigrant to the USA.

In 2016, Jackson County voters approved the creation of the Jackson County Children's Services Fund (CSF), with a one-eighth cent sales tax that would sunset after seven years. A CSF is allowed, by Missouri state statute, to be created in counties by a vote of the people, and exists to improve children’s mental health and social-emotional wellbeing.

It is hard to believe that, according to the Pew Research Center, more than 13% of the U.S. population speaks Spanish and is home to the world's second-largest population of native Spanish speakers after México. The way the data is trending, by 2050, one in three people in the U.S. will speak Spanish (this data includes bilingual people who also speak English).

During National Hispanic Heritage Month, we celebrate the rich Latino culture, vibrant art, deep family values and positive contributions of Hispanics living in the United States. This includes indulging in the delicious cuisine offered by countless family-owned restaurants scattered across the nation.

Over the years, I’ve written a few blog posts about CSL’s work in helping connect families to wealth- and asset-development opportunities. As you can read here, most of our work in this arena has been part of HUD’s Family Self-Sufficiency Program, and we’ve helped our neighbors at Hawthorne Place Apartments save more than $500,000 over the last five years. Twenty graduates have used their savings to buy a house which can have a multi-generational impact on wealth and asset-development.

Living in Independence my whole life, I’m fond of all things Harry S. Truman. President Truman once said, “Not all readers are leaders, but all leaders are readers.” My sister-in-law, Becca Alexander, was a voracious reader; something she did her whole life. She lost a heroic, four-year battle to cancer on December 27, 2021, at the age of 40.

Sometimes in life, you just meet people that have “it.” You can try to use a lot of adjectives to describe them, but when someone has “it,” you just know. Merideth Rose is one of those people.

June, a month of celebration, born through the struggles of continuously demanding change beginning with the Stonewall riots in 1969 to which set change in motion for the future of the LGBTQIA+ community. While PRIDE month is seen as being about love, acceptance and being proud of who you are, it has been a long road to get to where we are today, but there is still work to be done!