North County shelter receives millions from Jeff Bezos’ foundation to end family homelessness

SAN DIEGO — Interfaith Community Services, located in Escondido, received a $5 million grant from Jeff Bezos’ foundation, Bezos Day 1 Families Fund.

The foundation said the 38 groups were selected to use the donation to “continue their compassionate, needle-moving work to help families move from unsheltered homelessness and shelters to permanent housing with the services they require to achieve stability.”

“We just opened a new family shelter that has no government funding and it costs more than a million dollars a year to operate, we aren’t sure, haven’t been sure how to pay for it, we just knew it was needed, and so to have a gift like this come in, at a time when we are bringing families with children off the streets, into our shelter, helping them overcome homelessness, it’s truly transformational,” Greg Anglea, chief executive officer of Interfaith Community Services said in an interview with FOX 5 Wednesday.

Anglea said this funding will help at least 2,500 families have a place to call home.

“This grant will meet each family where they’re at, some families will benefit from our new family shelter, others will be able to end their homelessness much more quickly, and we can negotiate with a landlord to get them back into housing in a matter of hours or days,” Anglea said.

At a time of year full of Thanksgiving, Anglea and his staff at Interfaith Community Services now has a lot more to be thankful for, and the announcement of the funding came around the time of the group’s annual Thanksgiving dinner for the unhoused.

“We turn our soup kitchen operation into a five-star restaurant and we’re going to welcome them in, families, veterans, seniors,” Anglea said.

“It just does my heart great joy to see people enjoying the day,” said Gerry, a volunteer at Interfaith Community Services.

The funding came just a few months after Interfaith Community Services learned it would no longer receive a $50,000 grant from the City of Escondido that it had received annually for about a decade.

Escondido has the highest homeless population among cities in the North County. The latest data shows 499 people are unhoused in Escondido, but Interfaith helps people throughout the North County.

“We’re having a chance to give back to the homeless,” Interfaith’s Lead Cook Bill said. He used to be one of the people Interfaith helped, now he’s come full circle.

“I’m not only staff now, but I’m also an ex-participant because Interfaith helped me save my life,” Bill added.

Anglea said one issue they have is not knowing exactly how many families are homeless in the North County, and some of the funding will be used to gather data and determine who needs help and how best to help them.

Since the inception of Jeff Bezos’ Day 1 Families Fund, it has awarded $639.1 million to 208 groups and organizations.

2023 marks the sixth year of this award, and the first time Interfaith Community Services has received the funding. This year’s donations total $117.55 million to 38 organizations.

Interfaith was one of three foundations in California to receive the grant funding.