Nonprofit receives award, $40,000
Hazel and Dick Mitchell’s tireless efforts over the past decade to advocate for the compassionate treatment of people who are homeless in Tuolumne County were recognized by the Sonora Area Foundation on Monday.
The foundation’s board of directors presented the annual Irving J. Symons Award to the nonprofit organization Give Someone a Chance, which was founded by the Jamestown couple in 2012.
“It’s a community effort,” Hazel Mitchell said of their work. “It’s for the community, it’s for the homeless, and it just makes Tuolumne County shine, because we’re actually doing something to make sure the homeless are thought of, cared for, and know that we love them.”
In addition to the recognition, the organization received a $40,000 grant from the foundation that will help them complete their next big project — converting an old RV into a mobile laundry vehicle.
The couple initially thought they were going to the Sonora Area Foundation’s offices on Monday in hopes of convincing the board to give them a grant to purchase power generators for the mobile laundromat.
Dick Mitchell said they were about to launch into their presentation, when poker-faced SAF Board Member Bill Polley told them they were not going to provide them with the grant they were seeking.
“We’ve been rejected so many times, what you do is just fall back and move forward in another direction,” Dick Mitchell said.
Polley, however, then informed the Mitchells that they were being turned down because they were instead giving them the award and $40,000 to spend anyway they see fit for advancing their cause.
“They laid a trap for us,” Dick Mitchell said with a laugh while recalling the moment. “At that point in time, Hazel started crying big tears.”
The Mitchells said the award and grant was “beyond anything we believed could ever happen to us.”
Dick Mitchell said they work hard every year to raise “a thousand dollars here and thousand dollars there” to sustain their efforts and are lucky if they get more than $10,000 from their largest annual fundraising event, which they couldn’t do this year like many other nonprofit organizations because of COVID-19 restrictions.
“To get $40,000 just blew our socks off,” he said.
More so than the money, the Mitchells said the recognition feels like a confirmation of their approach to homelessness that focuses on the humanity behind the issue and helping those who are displaced meet their basic needs.
Give Someone a Chance converted a former Tuolumne County Transit bus into a mobile shower unit for the homeless that runs multiple days a week.
The organization also launched a pilot program called Camp Hope last year at the former Rotelli burn dump off Stockton Road, where homeless people have camped for decades, and brought together multiple organizations to provide amenities that include portable toilets, weekly trash service and a large tank for drinking water.
Operating costs at the camp total about $1,244 per month.
A sense of community spirit has developed among the more than 60 residents at Camp Hope, who have helped with various projects that include picking up tons of trash and cutting back weeds to make the area more fire safe. Despite facing pushback along the way, the organization has received accolades in recent years by a number of other organizations that include the Tuolumne County Chamber of Commerce and Center for a Non Violent Community.
“The general public is recognizing within themselves the need to support people who can’t support themselves,” Dick Mitchell said. “There’s a lot of it out there.”
The Mitchells estimate the mobile laundry vehicle will take about $30,000 to complete.
Hazel Mitchell said they plan to use the rest of the grant from the SAF as seed money for their ultimate long-term dream — to develop a designated site for the homeless modeled after the Kampgrounds of America system of privately held campgrounds.
They envision a campground with 150 spaces for homeless residents that would include water, power and sewer connections, an on-site commercial kitchen, and a building for vocational training that will double as a site for fabricating tiny homes to be occupied by the residents.
The Mitchells are hoping someone with land that has access to utilities would be willing to donate a piece for their plans. They previously owned 2.5 acres off Eagle Ridge Drive in East Sonora that they wanted to develop into a campground, but they had to sell it after the cost of providing water, power and sewer became insurmountable.
“Our dream is to see if we couldn’t start housing these people and making a dent in the population of how many are out there,” Hazel Mitchell said. “A positive program to let us know where to start.”
Hazel Mitchell said none of what their organization has accomplished over the years would be possible without the support and hard work of their board of directors, which is composed of Don Sullivan, Donald Ronalter, Dr. Larry Brunel, Nancy Gray, Megan Scoullar, and Dr. Georgia Thomatos.
Polley, of Twain Harte, served as a Tuolumne County Superior Court judge from 1989 to 2014 and on the Sonora Area Foundation board since 2007. He nominated Give Someone a Chance for the Irving J. Symons Award this year because of how much the Mitchells have poured into tackling one of the county’s most pressing problems.
“To the extent that anybody’s been successful, I think they have,” he said. “They have a real passion for their work and have put their energy and time and money into it, and we felt they deserved some recognition for that.”
Darrell Slocum, executive director of the Sonora Area Foundation, said the homeless issue is one that many in the county want to address, but it’s not an easy situation to take on because it’s complicated and can be problematic.
Slocum said the Mitchells and other volunteers behind Give Someone a Chance have worked hard at trying to find a long-term solution to homelessness and set a good example for the rest of the community to follow.
“They are also just trying to improve the quality of life for people who found themselves displaced and out in the camps,” he said. “They love on them and treat them with respect and dignity, and I think that’s something we can all learn from.”
The award is presented by the Irving J. Symons Foundation, one of the supporting organizations for the Sonora Area Foundation. They were founded by siblings Irvin Symons and Elaine Symons Baker, whose family’s roots in Tuolumne County date back to the 1850s.
Slocum said the organizations have received support for their philanthropic efforts by many multigenerational Tuolumne County families like the Symonses, but people like the Mitchells — who moved to the area full time after retiring in 1992 — show that it doesn’t matter how long someone has lived here to make a positive impact.
“Philanthropy and generosity doesn’t know where you were born and which generation you are, it’s all about your heart,” he said. “The board recognized what amazing heart they have for the community and that they go out everyday and try to make the community a better place.”