Housing Authority Community Partner of the Year Award to ALSB for 2015

 "The Housing Authority’s Community Partner of the Year Award was established in 2009. Past winners have included the New Beginnings Counseling Center and Path-Point to name a couple. This year’s selection of the Assistance League of Santa Barbara makes ALSB our 6th award recipient. When providing the ballot to all Housing Authority staff (each staffer gets 1 vote), we ask that they nominate an agency, organization and/or business for the “Community Partner Award”.   This year, ALSB was far and away the top “vote getter” by Housing Authority staff.  The reason was simple, the ALSB members that participate in tutoring young housing authority residents at our Family Opportunity Center are the most giving and “can do” volunteers we have ever encountered.  They give not just from the mind but from the heart as well.

As an organization created to serve the housing needs of low income seniors, the disabled and families, we recognize that we cannot meet all of the community’s affordable housing needs and our clients’ social service needs on our own.  We need to collaborate.  ALSB knows how to collaborate in very effective ways and have been critical to our success and that of our clients.  While we know we cannot “build our way” out of Santa Barbara’s most difficult affordable housing dilemma, we know we can make sure the young people we house are given every opportunity to succeed intellectually, emotionally and educationally so that they can pursue their socio-economic advancement and not be part of our future client population.  ALSB’s support of the Housing Authority’s mission, the relationship we enjoy with them and their responsiveness to our requests and ease of working with them, made them our obvious choice for the year’s Community Partner Award."

Rob Pearson, Executive Director/CEO Housing Authority of the City of Santa Barbara