In the second in our series on the challenges facing South African non profits in 2010, Sophie Hobbs spoke with Sandra Morreira, director of the Homestead Projects for Street Children. The consensus seems to be that while times are indeed tough for causes, committed individuals are helping keep them afloat through regular giving and volunteering.

It is the day of Bafana Bafana’s fateful game against France and Sandra Morreira clears her busy schedule to talk to me about the very specific challenges faced by her organisation, which works with street children – boys between the ages of six and 18 – in Cape Town. To a background of tooting vuvuzelas, Sandra explains how they rely on the commitment of individuals to keep going.

Friends of the Homestead

“We\'ve relied on individual giving for many years at the Homestead. We have something called Friends of the Homestead – people who contribute every month from their salaries by debit order. From small amounts of R50, up to R250-R300 a month – it makes an enormous difference because we get an amount every month that we can rely on.”

Things are difficult for the Homestead at the moment. The recession has meant fewer, and smaller, grants from the corporate sector: “And yet our expenses are going up because petrol goes up and food goes up and electricity goes up. We provide residential care for 100 kids every month so these are very basic, core expenses.”

The challenge for Sandra and her team is to get as many small donors as possible to contribute so that they can get in enough money to continue running their services.

Regular needs

“We need basic things like toothpaste and soap and deodorant and underwear. We practically never buy new clothing for the boys, they are clothed in second hand clothes donated by the public. These kinds of things are really quite simple to give and they help us so much,” says Sandra. “Any kind of tinned foods and even fresh foods – if we can get them quickly to the shelter, we can use them. It helps us to stretch our budget.”

Sandra also highlights their need for something that costs nothing: time. “We need people who are willing to be with the children in the afternoons, help them with their homework, read to them, maybe play sport with them.”

She laughs, “Trying to keep 100 boys occupied in the afternoons is quite difficult so we need all the help we can get!”

Commitment

Working with street children requires a special kind of commitment: “What\'s important when you\'re working with children, especially street children, is that they have been let down so many times by adults in the past. They\'ve had so many losses that they don\'t need to keep having brief little relationships with people.”

“They need a long term feeling that this person really cares about me and is going to continue coming to see me because I am of some value.”

Which is why, if you want to volunteer at the Homestead, you need to apply. “We have a form where you fill in what kind of skills you have and what your preferences would be,” says Sandra. And with the new Children\'s Act coming into force, she explains that all organisations working with children must now screen volunteers.

Success

Sandra shows me around the Homestead’s modest offices where a small but dedicated team keeps this vital service going. How many children are there on the streets of Cape Town now? “Very few,” according to Sandra who explains that, aside from a few hardened cases, most are in shelters like the Homestead or back at home with their families.

In fact, this is an unsung success story – by working together in a coordinated way, Cape Town has managed to all but eradicate the problem of street children. Sandra and her hard-working team are part of the reason for this success. We applaud their dedication.

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