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Dear Friends,
When we moved into our Ventura office a few years ago, I found a framed picture in storage from a United Way campaign poster. The poster is from the late 70s, around the time I was born, and features a family of five on the beach with the back of their station wagon open–the 70s style with the wide rear and wood paneling on the side. The mother is holding an infant, a young boy is in the car looking on with this teddy bear, his sister is playing in the sand, and the father looks helpless with all of their possessions strapped to the top of the car. Above them, the poster reads, “FOR THE HOMELESS IN VENTURA COUNTY, CAMPING IS NO VACATION.”
Below them, the text reads, “There is an estimated 2,000 homeless men, women and children in Ventura County, and that number is growing.” Forty years later, the numbers are not that dissimilar.