Learn About CARITAS
The more you learn about homelessness and CARITAS, the more equipped you will be to help us end this emergency facing so many of our neighbors and citizens.
Knowledge leads to understanding. Understanding leads to empathy. Empathy leads to solutions.
Learn about us, and how you can become a part of the largest, most inclusive emergency shelter and the only furniture bank in the Central Virginia area.
Learn how to become a part of keeping the immediate crisis of homelessness from becoming the definitive story of a life.
Together we can end homelessness--one life at a time.
BE IN THE KNOW! Come meet the staff, see the vision, catch the passion, understand the need and identify how YOU can make a difference! Table Talks & Tours are just that...lunch or breakfast with your CARITAS friends who will share their work and take you on a personal tour of the facility. Contact Cara at ckaufman@caritasva.org. to learn more.
10 Things You May Not Know About CARITAS
1. CARITAS is the only shelter in Central Virginia that accepts families with fathers.
2. Every willing guest of CARITAS is assigned a case worker who individually works through the legal, mental, medical, or financial obstacles standing between that guest and self-sufficiency.
3. CARITAS is the only shelter in Central Virginia that accepts families with adolescent males.
4. CARITAS provides substance abuse counseling.
5. All children are enrolled in school within 24 hours of entering CARITAS.
6. 73% of Single Adults and 89% of Families find housing through CARITAS.
7. All guests of CARITAS in case management are required to save 75% of their income earned into an escrow account, which they will use to secure permanent housing.
8. The CARITAS Furniture Bank is used by over 50 charitable organizations to provide furnishings for refugees, victims of natural disasters or violence, veterans, and those finally able to secure permanent housing.
9. CARITAS shelters each guest for a cost of only $26.31 a night. A night of jail costs $46. A night of prison $85.
10. Last year, 184 congregations and 18,560 volunteers gave over 100,000 hours of their time to provide 38,631 nights of shelter to over 1,000 guests.