Sisters homeless for the Holidays

I have been working with teens in Santa Barbara for years as the Program Director of the Santa Barbara Police Activities League. While walking downtown early one morning I bumped into Itzell, a recent high school graduate who was a part of our leadership group. I asked her how she was and she began to cry. Itzell had lost her mother to cancer four years ago. Since their mothers sickness things went from bad to worse.

While attending college in UC Irvine, her older sister Fatima parented her two younger siblings, travelling back and forth from college to be a part of their lives as much as possible.

Itzell and her sister Fatima (a recent UC Irvine graduate) were forced out of their home two days before Thanksgiving.

Officer Burleigh found them a temporary place at the Salvation Army and picked up their two small bags of clothes and no money in their pockets.

Itzell and Fatima are currently trying to find jobs in hopes to save enough money for an apartment to be reunited with their younger brother.

When Itzell was in high school she was a mentor to an elementary school youth, volunteered with her peers who had special needs, and even raised funds for a Holiday Dinner that gave back to underprivileged youth in Santa Barbara.

Today they are in need of our help.

Money raised will directly go towards permanent 
housing.