San Francisco, CA (PRWEB) October 31, 2013
The Home Depot Foundation continues to lend their support to veterans and impact our local community - this time with a recent $24,000 “Team Depot” grant to Swords to Plowshares to landscape, renovate, and beautify a veterans’ family housing site on historic Treasure Island. The Home Depot Foundation previously awarded Swords to Plowshares $545,540 for critical livability improvements to the Treasure Island housing site and a 75-unit housing project, Veterans Commons, both of which Swords to Plowshares operates in San Francisco.
“When corporate sponsors and individual volunteers are connected for the good of the community, amazing things happen," said Michael Blecker, Executive Director of Swords to Plowshares. “The Home Depot Foundation’s dedication to community is clear – they rehabbed and are now helping to maintain this housing for veterans and their families.”
After months of planning, Team Depot will convene a group of 60 volunteers and Home Depot staff to complete the project on Tuesday, November 5, 2013, in honor of Veterans Day. The grant supports costs for needed improvements to twelve apartment units and surrounding green areas on historic Treasure Island in San Francisco. This housing site, which opened January 2012, provides affordable 2-bedroom apartments to twelve formerly homeless and low-income veteran families.
Team Depot’s Captain for the upcoming November 5th grant event, Savannah Leeper, the store manager at the Hercules branch, is excited to get started. “It’s going to be a sea of orange on this island getting things done,” she indicated with a smile, referring to The Home Depot’s corporate colored shirts which Team Depot members will be sporting.
In keeping with the charitable theme La Boulange Café & Bakery is donating breakfast fare and Chipotle Mexican Grill will donate lunch burritos for the Team Depot volunteers and staff. Other local businesses have also gathered a group of volunteers for the day to support the event. TM Financial Forensics, LLC of San Francisco will send several volunteers to support this day of service.
“The commitment to ending veteran homelessness that the Home Depot Foundation and their local affiliates continue to demonstrate is truly remarkable,” said Leon Winston, Swords to Plowshares Chief Operating Officer. “Whether it be through their unprecedented support for the national campaign, providing millions in funding for housing renovation, or through providing materials, labor, and expertise in a project such as this year's effort to improve the quality of life for our veteran families on Chinook Court, words alone can't adequately express our appreciation.”
About Swords to Plowshares
Founded in 1974, Swords to Plowshares is a community-based, not-for-profit organization that provides counseling and case management, employment and training, housing and legal assistance to homeless and low-income veterans in the San Francisco Bay Area. Swords to Plowshares promotes and protects the rights of veterans through advocacy, public education, and partnerships with local, state and national entities.
War causes wounds and suffering that last beyond the battlefield. Our mission is to heal the wounds, to restore dignity, hope, and self-sufficiency to all veterans in need, and to prevent and end homelessness and poverty among veterans. Learn more about the work of Swords to Plowshares, and ways in which you can help, by visiting our website at http://www.swords-to-plowshares.org.