Table Of Content
For more than four decades, Covenant House has helped transform and save the lives of more than a million homeless, runaway and trafficked young people. We offer housing and support services to young people in need – helping over 46,000 boys and girls every year. Rights of Passage (ROP) is a longer-term (up to 24 months) residential program for young adults who have transitioned out of a crisis shelter. Young people in our ROP Program work closely with case managers and social workers to create personalized plans that will ensure their success on moving into independent, permanent housing.
How Serious Is Youth Homelessness?
Despite having a board of directors, Covenant House's public face has tended to be its presidents. Father Bruce Ritter founded Covenant House and served as president from 1972 to his resignation in 1990. In 2003 the board of directors elected Sister Patricia A. Cruise, S.C.. In addition to their administrative duties, the presidents of Covenant House have been known for their fundraising letters telling the stories of the youth Covenant House serves, some of which have been collected into books. Patricia A. Cruise resigned her position as president of Covenant House International in 2008. Kevin Ryan, formerly the Child Advocate of New Jersey, became president in 2009, and retired from the position on February 12, 2023.
Mission, Vision, & Values
Our Welcome Center and Youth Shelter team lovingly welcomes youth and meets their immediate needs for a hearty meal, a shower, fresh clothes, and a safe place to sleep. We then help young people develop a personal plan, with health, employment, education, and other goals. Sleep Out is your opportunity to spend a night outside and raise critical funds and awareness about the youth homelessness crisis. In February 1990, Covenant House founder and President Bruce Ritter was forced to step down in the wake of allegations of sexual and financial misconduct, beginning with the accusations of Kevin Kite, who accused Ritter of sexual abuse.
Human Trafficking Hotline
Ritter resigned but was never charged with sexual abuse.[6] Soon after, more accusations surfaced. Four men came forward publicly claiming to have been in sexual relationships with Ritter for years, including multiple who stated the relationships started when they were minors receiving services through Covenant House. A report later prepared for Covenant House counted a total of 15 reported cases of sexual acts between Ritter and youth and young adults who were living or volunteering at the shelter. In the late 1960s, the Reverend Bruce Ritter, a Franciscan priest, retired from his job as a professor at Manhattan College to begin a new ministry serving the city's poor. Joined by colleague Father James Fitzgibbon, he moved into a dilapidated tenement building in New York City's East Village.
Suicide & Crisis Lifeline
But young people who come from other countries need health coverage in order to get X-rays and other treatments. Lisa says CHNY staff have become experts in identifying and applying for the appropriate health coverage. Young people can access short-term emergency care through CHNY’s street outreach program, drop-in services, and emergency shelter. Our on-site clinic meets their health needs, and our Covenant Works program helps them navigate the world of employment. Rights of Passage, our transitional housing program, empowers youth to build the skills they need to live independently.
Anti-Human Trafficking
These grants will also support the retention of CHNY's 236 existing jobs and the creation of 25 new jobs. We provide direct Legal Services to our young people through in-house attorneys and referrals to outside service providers. Coordinating closely with Covenant House staff, we identify potential legal issues and work with young people to address them every step of the way. In addition, we regularly present a comprehensive series of detailed “Know Your Rights” workshops for young people and policy workshops for staff so they are better able to identify potential legal issues facing our young people. Covenant House New York’s mission is to help each young person find safety and refuge from the dangers of living on the streets.
CHNY and COVID-19
As many as 4.2 million young people will experience a period of homelessness this year in the U.S. alone. The causes of homelessness are complex, and many of the most vulnerable young people in our communities face the greatest risk. "They provided me with immediate services and helped me to understand how to navigate my life. Before I was living in stress and fear."
Covenant House New York, 460 West 41 Street - e-architect
Covenant House New York, 460 West 41 Street.
Posted: Sun, 10 Apr 2022 07:00:00 GMT [source]
Join the Fight to End Youth Homelessness
Your gift will help us continue to provide our youth with a safe place to sleep, clean clothes, food, and ultimately, a place to call home. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data. Across Covenant House sites, our experienced and diverse leaders are helping to improve outcomes and fight for social change. Covenant House International is committed to financial accountability and transparency with our donors, staff, and supporters.
Covenant House New York - Legal Services for Homeless Youth Office
Youth who come to our door and seek assistance are not turned away for any reason, and we operate under an open intake policy 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. In the event that we do not have a bed available for a young person, we work with and refer young people to other community partners who provide emergency housing to ensure that no young person has to spend a night on the streets. "Supportive housing and social services are critical to helping ensure all New Yorkers have access to the resources they need to lead successful and meaningful lives," Governor Hochul said. "By supporting transformative projects like Covenant House New York's new state-of-the-art facility, we are helping our most vulnerable get back on a path toward stability and opportunity."
Covenant House then acquired a group of buildings on West 44th Street and moved its administrative offices to the new location, which moved into a retrofitted cluster of buildings on West 41st Street in 1979. To address this challenge and ensure a community where all youth feel welcomed and heard, CHNY provided focused training for staff, in-person and electronic language courses for both staff and youth, and handheld translation devices, and we increased the number of our bilingual staff. Around the shelter signage now appears in multiple languages, including images and symbols in case a youth’s language is not represented.
CovWorks is our workforce development and educational support program, that now also includes vocational training and Individual Placement and Support (IPS), an evidence-based practice that increases positive employment and mental health outcomes among vulnerable youth. For nearly 30 years, CovWorks has prepared at-risk and homeless young people the opportunity to obtain and maintain employment, improve and advance their education, and pursue sustainable career paths with livable wages. In addition to vocational programming, CovWorks partners with businesses across New York City, establishing relationships that will ensure that young people are able to obtain employment in various sectors and with various backgrounds and work history. For over 50 years, Covenant House New York (CHNY) has been a leader in providing residential services to vulnerable homeless, runaway, and exploited youth. As the largest provider of runaway and homeless youth services in New York City, CHNY serves over 1,600 young adult ages annually with an operating budget of over 30 million dollars.
"Supportive housing and social services are critical to helping ensure all New Yorkers have access to the resources they need to lead successful and meaningful lives," Governor Hochul said. We are steadfast in our commitment to build a present and future of safety, healing, housing, and opportunity for young people facing homelessness. Covenant House is committed to providing unconditional love, absolute respect, and relentless support for each young person who walks through our doors. For over 50 years, Covenant House New York has been a leader in providing residential services to youth experiencing homelessness.
Our doors are open to all young people who need help, regardless of their race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression. We facilitate our services using trauma-informed principles to help homeless youth leave the streets and achieve independence. We also advocate for systemic change through public policy while promoting awareness of critical issues related to youth homelessness. Since 1972, we've opened our doors to more than 1.5 million young people experiencing homelessness and survivors of human trafficking. Every young person at Covenant House receives a warm bed, food, health and wellness services, a case manager, and, most important of all, unconditional love and absolute respect. Our Community Outreach and Drop-In Services ensure that schools, community centers, churches, and other community-based providers know about our mission and services so we can continue to engage youth who are experiencing homelessness.
William “Bill” Bedrossian, former CEO of Covenant House California, became CEO & president of Covenant House International on February 13, 2023. Search this collection of nationwide shelters and service organizations helping those in need. If you or a friend are a young person on the streets or are in danger in any way, Covenant House can provide immediate assistance. Part of the solution has been to steer youth toward alternatives that help them advance their education and language learning, Lisa says. The dynamic has changed over the ensuing months, as newcomers filter out throughout the city. Today, they arrive from a greater diversity of countries, most notably from African countries.
We hold a 4-Star rating (99%) from Charity Navigator, and a Platinum Seal of Transparency from GuideStar. If you have been the victim of a crime or need emergency assistance, call or contact your local police department below. If you or someone you know is a runaway, homeless, or at risk of becoming homeless, call the National Runaway Safeline or visit their website. When a young person from Chad came to our shelter speaking one of the country’s 120 local languages, but neither French nor Arabic, the dominant languages, CHNY turned to Chad’s consulate in New York for help.
Under CEO Bill Bedrossian’s current leadership, Covenant House International now serves more than 80,000 young people who experience homelessness each year. In 1972, Covenant House was officially incorporated with its first intake center established at 504 LaGuardia Place in lower Manhattan. As an established nonprofit, Covenant House began to raise money to provide shelter for homeless youth across New York City. In 1976, Covenant House acquired a group of buildings on West 44th Street in order to create a multiservice center near the Port Authority Bus Terminal.
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