Office for Social Ministry
Bishop Larry Silva Encourages Parish Support for Catholic Campaign for Human Development

Bishop Larry Silva Encourages Parish Support for Catholic Campaign for Human Development

Honolulu, Hawaii, November 9, 2011 - Bishop Larry Silva has sent a letter to all parishes strongly encouraging them to support the special second collection on Sunday November 20nd for the Catholic Campaign for Human Development—to Fight Poverty in America and Defend Human Dignity. Deacon Lauren Wong directs the local CCHD effort with support from the Diocese Office for Social Ministry. As Deacon Wong points out, “Each year one fourth or 25% of the total CCHD collection goes to fund Hawaii’s local CCHD grants and expenses.”

This past year the total Hawaii CCHD collection was $48,712 which meant that $12,178 went to the local Hawaii CCHD and $36, 534 went to the National CCHD office for national grants, such as the $45,000 national grant which went to an Hawaii organization Paradise Home Care Cooperative (PHCC).

  • Paradise Home Care Cooperative (PHCC) was funded to support a local cooperative of health care providers to rural areas on the Big Island of Hawaii. The health care workers cooperative was formed to empower the care givers to develop the skills, leadership and ability to take ownership of their lives, becoming business leaders in their community organizations providing high quality care while also reaping the full benefit of investing in their own business to ensure its long term success.  Specifically the funds were used to reinforce the Cooperative’s core staffing infrastructure, and create an advertising campaign that targeted private pay clients, and increased the opportunities for PHCC to create living wage jobs.  The grant was also used to support additional professional training to help the Cooperative become the preferred quality care givers of choice on the Big Island.

    • CCHD local funds provide grants that have gone to a range of community self help projects including:

  • HOPE Resource Center (previously known as Ponahawaiola) was funded with a local CCHD grant to provide transitional housing services as well as life and job skills to women and men returning to Hawaii’s communities from incarceration. The project is staffed 24/7 in a sober living environment. Random drug testing is conducted on site. Daily evening classes include house meetings, relapse prevention groups, gender specific groups, meth groups, new hire club, budgeting, renters education, computer classes, and other life skills classes, as well as specialized job skills such as photovoltaic solar cell installation. HOPE Resource Center offers an effective alternative to continued incarceration and a hopeful example of how to “prevent homelessness.” The Hawaii CCHD local grant to HOPE was for $16,650

  • Recovering Our Community-ROC Kalhi was funded with a local CCHD grant to support their efforts to “restore pride, community awareness and to work towards institutional change in Kahili Valley.” The grant focus was to work with youth from Elementary grades through Seniors in High School in producing stage plays about the different “hands-on projects with the Kalihi Uka community to engage, educate and mobilize the residents of Kalihi Valley in making physical and emotional changes, thereby restoring the community and taking pride in the place in which we live.” Specifically the grant supported their “Keiki Konnection” Drama which deals with the environment and the polluted Kalihi Valley Stream in the various public schools and community centers in their neighborhood. CCHD local grant of $11,000.

    • In the past other CCHD National Grants have included funding for advocacy groups such as FACE-Maui.

  • The purpose of FACE-Maui was to build community advocacy capacity at the inter-parish and inter-faith levels to educate community members about local and state housing policies and strategies for creating and preserving affordable housing and preventing foreclosures. Specifically FACE Maui has been engaged in hosting community forums with Hawaii Community Assets on affordable housing and foreclosures in Hawaii and helped organize delegations to discuss with local policy makers resulting in laws protecting the rights of homeowners in the foreclosure process. The CCHD national grant to FACE-Maui was for $30,000

    • Download:

    Bishop Larry Silva’s letter to Hawaii parishes (.pdf)
    Sunday Bulletin Instert Nov20 - Catholic Campaign for Human Development (.pdf)

    Learn More:

    Link to our Catholic Campaign for Human Development page.

    Contact:

    OSM’s Resource Developer, Fr. Robert Stark, SSS - phone: 808.203.6734 or email Fr. Stark at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)