LIFT

LIFT-DC provides client services in the areas of:

• Employment (both lack of employment and underemployment),
• Housing (including emergency housing, subsidized housing, and transitional housing),
• Public benefits and tax credits
• Referral services (including health care, children’s services, education/job training, legal services, immigration, food assistance, and computer literacy)

LIFT-DC clients find LIFT through referral partners, as well as through city agencies and word of mouth. LIFT-DC’s location within the Perry School Community Services Center, a central hub of social service providers working to assist the North Capitol Street neighborhood in the District, allows for many clients to work with LIFT and several other providers in one place.  With 77 percent of LIFT-DC’s clients identifying as unemployed, the DC office serves as a critical employment assistance support in the community. For example, many LIFT-DC clients are referred in from the Perry School’s Economic Empowerment Center for assistance with résumé creation and online job application assistance. In turn, LIFT-DC often refers existing LIFT clients to the Economic Empowerment Center for its job training and job readiness programs.  Clients can work in tandem with both organizations to improve their chances of being hired.

This past year, LIFT-DC has seen an increase in the number of referrals in from re-entry communities (halfway houses for formerly incarcerated individuals) and has worked with many of these individuals to secure housing and employment as they transition out of these re-entry communities.

LIFT-DC will soon be piloting a satellite site out of CentroNia, a bilingual public charter school and community services center located in the Columbia Heights neighborhood of DC. CentroNia aims to provide affordable, high quality education, professional development and family-support services in a bilingual, multicultural environment and LIFT will be able to provide its employment, housing, public benefits, and resource referral services to hundreds of additional families.  LIFT will focus on adapting its services to accommodate non-native English speakers, especially recruiting Spanish-speaking volunteers, to respond to the culture of the Columbia Heights neighborhood.