by Kristina Kuhaupt, Customer Experience Manager
I initially met Kristin Mathews, a Social Justice Center and Willy Pantry volunteer, late last year when we decided to donate Willy East extremely perishable items to their accessible food pantry across the street several times each week. This was a new endeavor for us, and I am happy to report it is going well and those items are now being put to good use. These items donated are in addition to our normal weekly pantry donation rotation throughout the city.
During our Co-op Community Reinvestment Awards Ceremony in April of this year, our recipients got to take a few moments to describe the work their nonprofit does as well as the project receiving grant funding this year. This allowed me to understand how Kristin and so many others at Social Justice Center (SJC) help the community day in and day out. Soon after, Kristin was very kind to show me and several other Co-op staff members around the Social Justice Center, which is steps away from our East store on Williamson Street. It was an enlightening experience for myself personally because although I drive past this organization several times a day, and know they work to improve social equity throughout Madison, I never realized how many member nonprofits are housed under their umbrella that work on different aspects of increasing resources, access, and equality for all Madisonians. I hope this interview allows you to gain more insight into this organization that many Eastsiders pass daily during their commutes.
Q: For most folks who live on the Eastside, the Social Justice Center is a well-known entity. However, for those who might not know about this organization that live throughout Dane County, can you please provide a brief overview on why SJC was created and its mission today?
A: “The Social Justice Center was established in 2000 by four local Madison nonprofits; Tenant Resource Center, Madison Community Cooperative, Wisconsin Community Fund, and Wisconsin Citizen Action Fund. Their goal was to provide office space to social justice organizations and to be an incubator space where smaller start-ups can grow their organizations with affordable rent and access to all of the necessary office amenities.
“Our founding organizations knew the challenges every nonprofit faces. For new organizations, the start-up costs can be overwhelming, especially without a roadmap to follow. By joining together, our founding organizations bought our building on Williamson Street to pool their resources so that more of their time and energy could be put towards achieving their missions.
“Our mission is to provide space for nonprofits to succeed in their pursuit of social justice, where the community can come together in support of the common good. SJC serves as an office building for local nonprofits critical to our community. The SJC facilities also include an art gallery, community meeting spaces, storage for community organizations, and a neighborhood rain garden. Through shared responsibilities and governance, our aim is to create an inspiring and collaborative environment where local nonprofits, activists, artists, and members of the Madison community can access resources, support, and services needed to thrive.”
Q: What is your role at the SJC, and what brought you to this organization?
A: “I started volunteering at the Social Justice Center after I retired in early 2021. I had known that this was a place I wanted to spend my time due to their mission and having met Annie Kraus, the director, during the Tony Robinson memorial celebrations over the years. It was clear to me from the beginning that SJC stood with members of the community in seeking justice in this and other wrongful acts they faced over the years. I had been involved in helping folks experiencing homelessness and food access issues prior to retirement, and volunteering with the Willy Street Pantry at SJC was a perfect fit for me. I help in getting food donations for the pantry, diapers from the Village Diaper Bank, and other non-essentials to get out to those in need. I promote both the Pantry and SJC on our social media sites and monitor the pantry request page as well.
“Over the past year, we have worked to assist people as they came through the doors at SJC, whether it was seeking assistance from Tenant Resource Center or needing some clothing and personal essentials to make their lives a bit less stressful. With our new Community Resource Hub opening, we are all excited to provide more resources and connections to our neighbors in the Williamson Street neighborhood. The hub will provide a space for folks to meet with their case managers, access computer time, and get help connecting with any other resources they may need. We all pride our space as being judgment-free and welcoming to all, where people place their trust in us and feel safe opening up about their struggles.”
Q: There seem to be many entities housed within SJC that provide services to the community. Can you go over each of those, as to bring light to all these available resources?
A: “There are 15 member organizations housed at the Social Justice Center. We have quite a mix, from Tenant Resource Center, to Madison Community Cooperative, Mutual Aid Network to Books to Prisoners. Some of the members are in the building on a daily basis, where others only use the space in the evenings or as needed. The wide variety of nonprofits housed at SJC is part of what makes it so special!
“All of the member organizations are listed and more fully explained at: www.socialjusticecenter.org/our-member-orgs”
Q: The Co-op was excited to partner with you as one of our 2023 Community Reinvestment Grant recipients. Can you tell us a little about your project, and what folks will now find at your organization because of this continued work?
A: “First, we plan to increase staff time for community support and our resource advocacy programming. We hope to hire an additional staff person whose time would be dedicated to this program. Staff duties include co-advocating with existing outside service providers to support our neighbors in crisis, coordinating the community partner schedule (outside organizations placing representatives at SJC to do outreach), training volunteers, and managing the community support space.
“Second, in order to be truly accessible and inclusive, especially for people most impacted by oppression and inequality, we need to be able to resolve conflicts restoratively and provide trauma-informed support to people in crisis. To build these skills, our aim is to have a series of trainings covering four areas: conflict resolution, harm-reduction, communication, and social issues. Our community space will have public computers and a printer that will require additional IT management from our support staff. We would like to have assistance available for visitors who need to navigate technology for essential tasks like checking email, online banking, or submitting paperwork.
“And finally, the funds will help to provide the proper setting for this community center. Recently, SJC has designated the front part of our building as our community space. This space has traditionally been rented by one of our member organizations and we rely on our members’ monthly rental payments to cover our essential expenses. The space is crucial because it will provide a flexible and comfortable setting to achieve these various outcomes. The space includes small meeting rooms, computer workstations, ample seating, and walls of brochures/other informational literature. In addition, we will be adding an outdoor phone charging station in the near future.”
Q: How did COVID impact the Social Justice Center and how can the community help?
A: “Over the years, especially since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, assisting community members in crisis find support and connect with vital resources has become a major part of the Social Justice Center’s staff responsibilities and the primary focus of our volunteer program. This change has not been accompanied with a change in our modest organization’s budget, so our staff and board of directors have to prioritize other aspects of our organization first. This means the overall benefit for individuals coming to SJC for urgent assistance has been greatly limited, since the time allotted for “resource advocacy” (helping folks connect with resources and services) is less than the amount of times we encounter people in desperate situations who, through word of mouth recommendations, are looking to SJC for help. This has been one of our most pressing challenges to date.
“The individuals who’ve become regular visitors at SJC could be described as “complex cases” due to past conflict or violations with traditional service providers, barriers to accessing livelihoods and stability, and living with multiple challenges including homelessness, mental health, and substance-use disorders, and being ‘justice-involved.’ Living with multiple challenges means navigating more bureaucratic systems and keeping track of more information, which are additional challenges of their own. This is the portion of our community that needs the most support in order to have long-term stability. As far as numbers go, since the beginning of the pandemic, we’ve worked with over 100 individuals experiencing homelessness, who could be described as ‘shelter-resistant’ or “provider-avoidant.” Because the social services terminology can be so dehumanizing, we use ‘VIPs’ to refer to these folks because they are facing very intense predicaments and they’ve become important people to the SJC community.
“Our community can help in several ways! First and foremost, we are looking for volunteers to assist in our resource hub. We are implementing specific times during the week when individuals can access our space and have support available to navigate needed resources. Volunteers are instrumental in making this happen and we will provide the needed training to interested parties. Also, providing donations to our Willy Street Co-op outdoor pantry and our essentials pantry is an ongoing, critical need. There are set hours when folks can come and receive help with obtaining essentials or fill out an online request form to fulfill their needs. Volunteers can help with various aspects of the pantry as well. We are implementing volunteer orientations to assess interests of incoming community members and you can fill out an interest form on the SJC website at: www.socialjusticecenter.org/blog-posts/volunteer-2023”
Closing Thoughts
I want to thank Kristin for taking time out of her busy schedule not only to volunteer at the Social Justice Center but to also explain to our Co-op community of Owners all the wonderful things this organization helps facilitate each and every day; it is greatly appreciated! If you are interested in volunteering and/or donating to this well-run non-profit, please see the links above that were provided. My hope is that if you have not known about this organization before, you have gained a better understanding of their mission, and how your Co-op partners on your behalf with many organizations like the Social Justice Center to fulfill Principle #7: Concern for the Community. Below is a reminder of all Cooperative Principles.
