Victory on the move covering new ground with our Mobile Prevention Team annual report 2016 Our mission Victory Programs opens doors to recovery, hope and community for individuals and families facing homelessness, addiction and chronic illnesses like HIV/AIDS. Our dedication Victory Programs proudly dedicates our 2016 annual report to: Michael Whitmore, founder and principal architect at the firm Roundel 47, has for 25 years offered Victory Programs his distinguished multi-talented vision to design, construct and improve nearly all of our community-based health programs and housing sites. His original artful building designs, masterful rehabs, state-of-the-art modification plans and meticulously studied zoning opinions have never ceased to amaze us. He makes each seemingly impossible project miraculously come true. In his work and in his life, Michael’s designs are nothing short of inspired and elegant. Michael makes every square inch of life count. And …. The Massachusetts Convention Center Authority (MCCA), which operates both the Hynes Convention Center and the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center. For nearly 25 years, the MCCA has generously donated the space at the Hynes and hosted our annual Celebration of Life Thanksgiving Dinner in support of Boston’s HIV/AIDS community. The Celebration of Life is a popular community event for people living with HIV/AIDS with an important history dating back to the height of the AIDS crisis. This magnanimous in-kind donation year after year is truly a celebration of life and serves to give hope to everyone in the Boston HIV/AIDS community, and their family and friends. Photography by Michael Basu, Greig Cranna, Patrick Lentz, Steve Lord, Promessa Studios and others. Design by Flatfive Design, www.flat5design.com victory programs 1 dear friends of victory programs “Greatness is never a given. It must be earned.” - President Barack Obama, January 20, 2009 For 41 years Victory Programs has earned its reputation First site in Roxbury; when we built ReVision as a great agency. Respect was never a given. Urban Farm to bring healthy nutritious food to our We earn and re-earn the esteem of our clients and community; when we rewrote our philosophy of care our community every day by ensuring our founders’ to promote evidence-based, substance-use treatment original promise: “All people deserve treatment and care. services centered on a harm reduction model of We take everyone.” This remains the fundamental care and treatment. foundation of every program and service we offer. We earned our reputation as an agency willing to We earned our reputation as trailblazers in the 1970s: fight for vital resources again in the 2010s when as the first to accept individuals diagnosed with both we merged with the Boston Living Center; when we mental illness and addiction; the first to open our doors overcame the catastrophic loss of our major women’s to Vietnam veterans combating the ravages of Post- treatment program on Boston Harbor’s Long Island Traumatic Stress Disorder; the first to offer services to after the bridge that served as the only access point LGBTQ individuals long before concerns about LGBTQ was closed. We rose to the challenge, forging ahead equal rights hit the national stage. until we acquired two alternative sites in Dorchester and Roxbury to rebuild new state-of-the-art women’s We earned our reputation of serving the hardest to treatment programs. place individuals and families in the 1980s: as the first Massachusetts agency to open a women’s Section Today, we still push new boundaries and we still earn 35 residential home as an alternative to incarceration; our reputation. In 2015 we established our new Mobile the first agency to actively open all our services to Prevention Team. Everyday we work in the community individuals with HIV and symptomatic AIDS; the first to to address sexual health risk factors, living with HIV, offer permanent housing for those in addiction recovery drug user health education and advocacy around also living with HIV; the first to launch a statewide access to treatment for Hepatitis C. Mobile AIDS Resource Team. Throughout our history, we face down adversity, We earned our reputation as leaders in the 1990s: unpredictable losses, capricious political environments as the first to open all our residential programs to and fluctuating economic uncertainties to rise above those on medication-assisted treatment, thus ensuring challenges. Many have remarked: medically-managed methadone maintenance was “If anyone can make it, Victory Programs can.” no longer a barrier to accessing residential services. We earn our reputation one day at a time because we In the new century, the 2000s, we earned our are always working to keep our original promise. We reputation for expanding to meet emerging community say “Victory is on the move” because, no matter what the needs when we opened our low-threshold Housing emerging issue is, all people deserve treatment and care. Jonathan D. Scott, President & CEO Pamela C. Feingold, Chair of the Board victory programs 1 victory programs community map Victory Programs Administration Mobile Program Location Based Program 13 Cambridge Downtown 14 Boston 17 Back Bay Fenway South End Victory Health 5 South Boston 1 Living and Recovering Community (LARC) 15 2 New Joelyn's Home 10 Boston Harbor 3 New Victories Islands 3 4 Shepherd House 16 5 Victory House 9 4 2 6 Women's Hope Jamaica Plain Roxbury Victory Housing 1 6 7 Bobbie White N Housing Services Dorchester 8 Cedar Family Home 9 Chamblet Family Home 12 11 Victory Health Victory Housing10 Portis Family Home 11 ReVision Family Home 8 12 ReVision Urban Farm 1 Mattapan 2 9 13 Ruah House 8 14 Serenity Supportive Housing 3 102 Quincy 15 Technical Assistance Program 11 4 16 Victory Housing on Warren Street 12 5 13 Victory Prevention 6 14 17 Boston Living Center 7 15 18 Mobile Prevention Team 16 17 2 annual report 2016 victory programs 3 18 19 Chamblet Family Home meet the mobile prevention team “Meeting people where they are at” is the unofficial motto of our Mobile Prevention Team. In 2015, Victory Programs recognized the need to offer support to individuals and families through low-barrier, low-threshold services, beyond our core residential services. The team focuses on education, navigation and risk-assessment services for both internal and external high-risk clients including active drug users and individuals with chronic health issues like HIV/AIDS or Viral Hepatitis. The Mobile Prevention Team is comprised of four projects: Drug User Health, Positive Prevention, Primary Prevention and Viral Hepatitis. These projects each offer both group level interventions and individual interventions. Our Mobile Prevention Team staff can connect with clients for both one-time interventions and long-term support, often accompanying clients to appointments, connecting with their case managers and working with them on goal-setting and risk-assessment. Victory Programs is literally on the move, covering new ground. Meg von Lossnitzer, Deputy Director of Victory Prevention, leads the team. Drug User Health Project The Drug User Health Project is one of the pilot The Drug User Health Project conducts trainings with locations for the State of Massachusetts’ Overdose partner organizations including Pine Street Shattuck Education and Naloxone Distribution work. Shelter, Rosie’s Place, St. Francis House, Women’s “The main thing we concentrate on is overdose Lunch Place, Health Care Resource Centers and education,” explains Christopher Richard, the Drug local community groups as well as internal trainings User Health Coordinator, “particularly in regards to for Victory Programs’ clients. Individuals who have opioids and naloxone distribution. What we are doing been through the trainings can obtain naloxone is getting naloxone into the hands of active users.” directly from the Drug User Health Project Outreach continued on page 4 » 2 annual report 2016 victory programs 3 meet the mobile prevention team (continued) Educators or through any Massachusetts “I believe in the work we do, in our philosophy pharmacy and are protected by Massachusetts of care and in meeting people where they are at,” Good Samaritan laws. she shares. The goal of the Primary Prevention/ Sexual Health Risk Reduction Project is to To date, the Drug User Health Project has enrolled decrease the rates of HIV & STI transmission. 600 individuals in the Overdose Education and The project runs two evidence-based group Naloxone Distribution pilot program. interventions: VOICES and Safer Sex Skill Building in addition to working with clients one-on-one Positive Prevention Project on goal-setting and risk-assessment. Our Positive Prevention team works with individuals with a positive HIV diagnosis Viral Hepatitis Project and offers peer support groups, one-on-one Viral Hepatitis, which includes Hepatitis A, B assessments and navigation services including and C, is a stealthy public health risk – often referrals to care, emotional support, education asymptomatic, individuals can live for years and medication compliance assistance by without knowing they’ve been infected. Unlike connecting with individuals through peer support. A and B, if left untreated Hepatitis C will develop “We learn about our clients’ risks through the into a chronic infection in 80% of cases and is initial risk-assessment and then ask them likely to cause chronic liver disease. ‘What are your goals?’ We then help them work on those goals through follow-up visits,” says Revathi As an organization, we recognized the urgent Penumatsa, the Positive Prevention Coordinator. need for better education about Viral Hepatitis for our clients and our staff. The Viral Hepatitis The Positive Prevention team facilitates Project is dedicated to expanding education workshops at our Boston Living Center including around this often misunderstood disease, the peer support group "Bridges for Life" and the including how to reduce the risk of transmission “Thriving Not Just Surviving” group for women.