The San Diego Foundation established the Health & Human Services Working Group in May 2001, with a mission to improve the health, well-being, and self-sufficiency of all people and communities in the County of San Diego. The Working Group is composed of community volunteers from various health and human services fields, including representatives from San Diego's academic, business, government and nonprofit communities.

The Health & Human Services Working Group seeks to support programs and activities that are designed to leverage resources; are prevention-oriented; promote self-sufficiency, diversity, and organizational effectiveness.

In this three year initiative, the Health & Human Services Working Group will focus on the prevention of family homelessness in the San Diego region.

By almost any indicator, San Diego has a critical housing crisis resulting from the high cost of housing combined with the high proportion of low wage earners. The Foundation’s Health and Human Services initiative is focused on preventing homelessness in families. In particular, the initiative is targeted to early interventions that decrease a family’s vulnerability to homelessness and increase the stability of the home environment by the following mechanisms:

1. Increasing financial literacy and thereby increasing the likelihood that families learn to
budget and save their resources.
2. Supporting educational opportunities and job training in order to increase the income of a family to earn a living wage and secure employment providing healthcare and other benefits.

The Foundation will support organizations whose programs contribute to the following:

• An increase in financial literacy in vulnerable families by promoting the establishment of checking and savings accounts, emergency funds, affordable housing and first time home buyer programs through programs such as:
  • Personal financial management training
  • Budgeting and saving
  • Understanding tax credits
  • Personal Investing
  • Understanding first time home buyers loans
    
• An increase in educational and job training programs leading to employment with health benefits for working poor families through programs such as:
  • Workforce education
  • Work readiness
  • Improved/upgraded skills training
  • On-the-job training programs