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NEWS BRIEFS

A Day Of Celebration And Remembrance

Area organizations serving the HIV/AIDS community will sponsor a Carnival and Health fair on December 1, World AIDS Day, from 2:00 to 6:00 at the Tarrant County Health Department, 1101 South Main Street. The family-friendly event will feature food, fun, games, free AIDS testing, booths and prizes. A memorial service will be held at 5:00 p.m. The public is welcome, so come out and join the fun!

Out of the Box Luncheon

Friends and supporters of Samaritan House will gather on Thursday, November 12 for the agency’s annual Out of the Box fundraising luncheon. The free one-hour program will include a musical number by the Samaritan House choir, under the direction of Sheran Goodspeed Keyton, and personal stories told by Samaritan House residents. Attendees are advised that they will be asked for a donation, but that there is no obligation. If you would like to receive an invitation to this event, please contact Diana Menchaca (817.332.6410, x195 or dmenchaca@samaritanhouse.org.)

Safety Rocks at Sam House

On Saturday, September 19, Samaritan House presented a Safety Fair, open to residents, staff and members of the community at large. Kids enjoyed exploring a real fire truck, and everyone had a great time listening to live rock music provided by Social Work Case Manager G.B. Watson and his band. The event, organized by Rick Isaminger, Samaritan House’s Family Health and Education Coordinator, provided information about safety issues and proved once again that learning can be fun!.


	By reducing homelessness, substance abuse, crime, new HIV infections, and the demand for publicly funded medical care, Samaritan House makes Fort Worth a better place for everyone!

Samaritan House News November 2009

Letter from the President

Honoring Samaritan Heroes

The Art of Giving

TCU Students Learn by Doing

Letter from the President

Steve Dutton

It’s easy to think of a large, successful agency such as Samaritan House as an institution made up of departments and funded by government and foundation grants. In reality, though, we are a collection of individuals – residents, staff, volunteers, donors, and community collaborators – each of whom contributes his or her unique talents or resources to the effort to combat AIDS and homelessness in our community. In this issue of the newsletter, we salute several different kindss of Samaritan House supporters: doctors who serve those who are HIV-positive and without resources, an artist who donated his work to honor Samaritan Heroes, and college students learning about social work by helping organize an important Samaritan House event. Read on to see some of the many ways members of the community choose to further our cause.

Honoring Samaritan Heroes

Dr. Stanley Cal	Visitors to Samaritan House are often impressed by the progress being made in many residents’ lives. What is sometimes not so apparent is the extent to which individuals and organizations connected to Samaritan House contribute to this success. The Samaritan Heroes Awards, to be presented for the first time on December 1, World AIDS Day, recognize individuals who are making significant impact on the lives of persons living with HIV/AIDS in Fort Worth and surrounding communities of Tarrant County.

	Dr. Stanley Cal and Dr. Elvin Adams will receive the Samaritan Heroes Award for their

their many years of work providing primary medical care to HIV/AIDS-infected individuals. Dr. Cal, a former JPS Health Network physician, has worked in this field since the late 1980s, when there was first awareness of HIV/AIDS in Fort Worth. Dr. Adams, a former Tarrant County Health Department physician, has worked with individuals infected by HIV/AIDS since 1999.

Dr. Elvin Adams

Both these doctors worked with patients who have no financial resources and who otherwise would not have received treatment. Their work began in the early days of AIDS, when the stigma associated with the disease discouraged many from becoming involved. When one of their names is mentioned at Samaritan House, there is almost always a resident nearby who will join the conversation with some version of the statement, “Dr. Cal (or Dr. Adams) saved my life.”

The awards will be presented at a reception to be held on December 1 from 5:00-6:30 p.m. at the new Tarrant County Medial Society Building, 555 Hemphill Street, Fort Worth. Tarrant County Judge Glen Whitley and JPS Health Network President &CEO Robert Early will present the awards; Dr. Adams and Mark Wilson, Manager, STD/HIV Prevention & Control at County Health Department, will speak about AIDS in Fort Worth. The event will be hosted by the new Young Professionals @ Samaritan House volunteer group. Individuals and organizations from the medical, pharmaceutical, and business communities and general public are invited to attend.

Samaritan House recognizes the extraordinary efforts these two individuals have made in helping persons in our community who suffer from HIV/AIDS. Speaking of Dr. Cal and Dr. Adams, Samaritan House CEO & President Steve Dutton says, “What a remarkable decision they made, to focus on a disease that has robbed so many lives of their health and that has created so much poverty. They were willing to look beyond the prejudice and stigma attached to AIDS and simply do the best they could to make survival an option for their patients, giving them a chance to rebuild their lives.”

The Art of Giving

Tim Todd	Sometimes it seems that anything is possible at Samaritan House. All it takes is someone in the community with a particular talent or resource combined with the desire to help Samaritan House. There’s almost always a need that corresponds to what is offered, and agency staff work hard to find that match.

	Case in point: This summer Samaritan House CEO Steve Dutton encountered an unusual and striking glass sculpture by Tim Todd, Executive Director of a newly-formed glass art school, SiNaCa Studios -

School of Glass. "Something clicked," says Steve. "I knew that something similar to this piece would make an outstanding award, in particular a Samaritan Hero Award."

The idea of honoring individuals in the community who have contributed significantly to the battle against AIDS had been around for a couple of years, but finding an appropriate award piece was the catalyst that made the awards a reality.

Tim responded enthusiastically to Steve’s request for donating two similar pieces. On December 1, World AIDS Day, Samaritan House will present two of Todd’s handsome pieces to Dr. Stanley Cal and Dr. Elvin Adams at the first annual Samaritan Heroes Awards reception (see article above).

Tim holds a BBA degree in International Business from Texas Wesleyan University and an MBA in Human Resources Management from the University of Dallas. After many years in the corporate world, owning a modeling agency and working as a human resources manager, he left the private sector and studied for four years in the glass program at the University of Texas at Arlington, focusing primarily on kiln-formed glass.

Shortly thereafter, Tim opened his working studio, T2 Glass, in Fort Worth. He later relocated his studio to the prominent Design District in Dallas, introducing his work to various art galleries. During this time he was awarded his first prominent commissions for Neiman Marcus and Art Ability.

Tim moved T2 Glass back to Fort Worth to balance his very active studio work with his appointment as Executive Director of Fort Worth’s new glass art school, SiNaCa Studios. The vision for SiNaCa is to make Fort Worth the premier glass art destination in the Southwest. A believer in giving back, Tim also collaborates with Imagination Celebration on a project that teaches kids glass art skills.

In the midst of a busy, successful art career and the launch of a brand-new organization, Tim took the time to consider how he might give back to the community that is supporting his work. Aware of the significant contribution made by Samaritan House to the effort to combat the AIDS epidemic, he offered his talent and resources to help in this endeavor.

“Sometimes all it takes is one individual’s generosity and thoughtfulness,” says Samaritan House CEO Steve Dutton. “The general idea of honoring Samaritan Heroes became a reality partly because Tim Todd stepped forward and offered an appropriate award for their contributions.”

TCU Students Learn by Doing

Samaritan House and local colleges and universities have long enjoyed a mutually-beneficial relationship. Sam House provides internship and volunteer opportunities to students looking to broaden and deepen their learning experience by working in the “real world” of a successful non-profit organization, and students help implement a variety of projects.

This fall, 13 students enrolled in the Generalist Practice with Communities and Organizations course in TCU’s Department of Social Work have taken on the responsibility for producing the first annual Samaritan Heroes Awards reception. The project puts them in direct contact with the agency’s staff and provides hands-on experience in event organization.

Leslie Lovett

"This project, like others in the past, has made social work skills 'real' as students experience the challenge of actually doing something to help address an issue or problem in the community," says Leslie A. Lovett, Clinical Assistant Professor of Social Work and Director of Field Education in TCU’s social work department. “They get to see the results of their work and the positive changes they made, which is a much more powerful learning experience than traditional academic projects such as writing a paper or taking a test."

Lovett and Samaritan House Vice-President and COO Ted Lovato worked together over the summer to place two BSW students as interns at the agency. Lovett, always on the lookout for rewarding projects for her Communities and Organizations students, asked Lovato if Samaritan House would be willing to let a group of students work on a project that would benefit the agency. The Samaritan Heroes project was a perfect match.

Lauren Taylor

Lovett chose Lauren Taylor to serve as student liaison, with responsibility for coordinating student efforts and communicating progress and challenges to Lovett and to agency staff. “This event is an opportunity not only to experience first-hand working in a community and organization, but it is also an opportunity to honor two outstanding doctors who have provided services to people who would otherwise have gone without,” says Taylor.

Taylor and her team have done an outstanding job of pulling together the myriad details that event organization entails: creating an invitation list according to criteria established by agency staff, designing and hand-addressing invitations, and arranging refreshments and décor for the reception. In the process, they have experienced being on the “inside” of an agency that provides direct services to more than 350 people.

Cooperation and collaboration with various community organizations and individuals is much more than an incidental or occasional happy accident at Samaritan House. “Building relationships in the community is essential to fulfilling our commitment to provide the best and most extensive services to as many as possible of those in need,” says Samaritan House President and CEO Steve Dutton. “Collaboration with organizations such as TCU gives to the community in many ways. Students, who will be serving the community as professionals in coming years, gain invaluable experience; and Samaritan House is able to expand its services and take on new projects that otherwise wouldn’t be possible.”

If you or your organization has an idea for collaborating with Samaritan House, please contact Diana Dugan, Volunteer Recruiter, at 817.332.6410, x 176 or ddugan@samaritanhouse.org.

We hope these stories will inspire you to think about ways in which you could use your own talents and resources to the benefit of Samaritan House. Just tell us what you can do, and we will help you match that capability to a need at Samaritan House. You’ll be surprised at what a valuable contribution you can make!