Despite the struggling economy and housing market, 2009 has been a year of great progress for DACKKs. This spring we have taken major steps to fulfill our LINKs TWO grant from HUD to house five chronically homeless and disabled adults. We recently closed on three properties - two in Fairlawn and one in Hackensack - and are now actively working with social service agencies to move qualified individuals from the street into their new homes. In addition, we expect to close on the fifth property in the coming months.

Once we complete the placement of tenants in the five LINKs TWO apartments, DACKKs will be providing safe and supportive housing for 12 adults and 5 children in 11 properties. While this is a time to recognize our success, success brings its own challenges – to support our tenants... to maintain the increasing number of properties… and to develop new financial resources that will allow us to extend our reach.

Supporting our tenants: Last year we bought the first of five LINKs TWO apartments –a newly renovated Hackensack condo- and rented it to a 63 year-old man whose sole income is social security disability. He came to us after having lived on the streets, in homeless shelters and in parking garages for over fifteen years. He pays thirty percent of his disability check to rent.

The transition has been a challenge: he has no family support, old habits, and few basic living skills. He is learning how to follow a daily schedule of chores, pay his bills, budget his money…. all things that we take for granted. But he pays his rent faithfully. With our help and the assistance of his caseworker, he is working toward independence.

While the individual situations vary, DACKKs works to ensure that each tenant placed in our properties has the support to build and sustain a productive life.

Maintaining our properties: A team of DACKKs volunteers sets up each property with furniture, supplies and the basic amenities of life. But this is just the beginning. As we all experience in our own homes, small and large repairs are the bane of home ownership. Here again, DACKKs volunteers play a critical role, but with a growing inventory of properties, maintenance costs inevitably mount… which brings me to the third of our success-driven challenges…

Bolstering our financial sources and support: As I noted in our annual appeal letter, from 2004 to 2007, DACKKs received challenge grants from the Domain Fund, a private foundation that provides seed money to new organizations as they build their donor base. These challenges have accomplished their goal!   DACKKs has been able to grow and build its own support and now we are on our own.

Today DACKKs must rise to a two-fold challenge: support a growing number of properties and clients and replace former funding sources with new ones – all in the uncertain 2009 economy. To this end, we are working to broaden our exposure in Bergen County and maximize our fundraising efforts. Key to this strategy are:

• Our spring capital campaign appeal letter that should be reaching our supporters shortly.
• Smaller, year round support events including a “Pizza on the Grill” get-together on July 16, our second “Spa Night”
  at Ridgewood's Town and Country Apothecary on September 24, and coming up on Monday, June 15,
  a cooking lesson at Williams Sonoma, Riverside Square - “Greek flavors: A Summer Menu.”
• Our annual “Wine and Food” fundraising event that will take place at the lovely Brick House on Monday, November 16.
• Stepped-up news and publicity releases to town and county publications.
• A revamped website that will generate more interest in DACKKs and facilitate donor support.