Thanks to our partners at the APT Foundation, DESK’s entire staff received or renewed their basic life support certification. Working with countless community members each year across the region, DESK staff are often the first to respond before first responders arrive. In critical, life-threatening situations, when seconds matter, a robust first response can be the difference between life and death. This workshop helped our staff recognize the signs of an emergency and develop skills to respond both individually and as a team, including how to use an Automated External Defibrillator.
This includes connections to shelter, food, vital documents, storage, showers, mail services, enrollment in government benefits, and clothing. We’re proud to have added basic life support skills to our toolkit.
DESK’s Drop-in and Resource Center serves New Haven neighbors experiencing homelessness with vital support in the afternoon and evening, six days a week, so DESK staff are often the first to respond before first responders arrive. In situations where seconds matter – like sudden cardiac arrest – having the proper equipment can truly be the difference between life and death.
The students’ teacher, Maura Galante, offered to get her students involved in DESK, and after working with DESK’s Development team, identified a need for more art in DESK’s 266 State Street Drop-in and Resource Center to help guests feel safe, comfortable, and welcomed. Galante’s students learned about DESK’s mission and food insecurity in New Haven, and then created art showcasing different foods in each student’s individual style. “They embraced the project – it was a social-emotional learning lesson where they brainstormed appropriate imagery and considered what they’d want to see in a community center. They wanted to make positive and uplifting messages for the diners,” said Galante.
Young volunteers help support DESK through food and clothing drives, school events, and volunteer opportunities that include families, and we are always looking for new partnerships that can help us meet our mission and to spread awareness through education about homelessness, food insecurity, and poverty in New Haven, including through donations, drives, and volunteer opportunities.
If you’re hanging out in New Haven, you’ve probably felt like there are more people sleeping on the streets than in the past. Your perception reflects reality, and not just for our city, but all across the state, and indeed the country. There are currently 405 individuals and eight families in Greater New Haven who are on the waitlist to get into shelter. Even during the coldest months of the year, we continue to have too few options for people to get in off the streets and find warmth and safety. Faced with federal cuts to the proven practices of reducing homelessness by providing unhoused people with housing, we are anticipating these numbers to nearly double this winter, as DESK’s services for unsheltered people become a matter of life and death. Meanwhile, cities nationwide have seen stepped up aggression toward unhoused people. Despite the evidence that strategies rooted in compassion have greater success of getting people housed, many municipalities have been opting for law enforcement approaches, emboldened by last year’s Supreme Court ruling in Grants Pass v. Johnson.
Public health is getting worse
Connecticut generally and New Haven specifically have a long history of providing proven, best-practice services to people who use drugs. In the 1990s, New Haven piloted one of the first syringe service programs as a highly effective means of reducing rates of infectious disease (particularly HIV) and creating pathways to trust, treatment, and recovery. Now those harm reduction models are under attack by federal authorities who reject science and seek to reinvigorate the “war on drugs” policies that targeted our Black and brown communities and failed all of us. Because of these cooperative, responsible, and well-funded services, New Haven has seen falling rates of fatal overdoses in the last five years. But despite the ample evidence, public funders are now shying away from what we know works for political reasons. As these funding sources disappear, it will be up to community-based organizations like DESK to ensure that people get the services they need to remain safe and healthy.
So what do we do?
For almost 40 years, DESK has been fighting an uphill battle against homelessness and poverty. We do this because we believe that we, as a community, can do better. We haven’t always been on the same page as our political leaders. Some-times, our elected officials have turned away from the compassionate approaches and best practices that we know work. When that happens, we look toward community—our neighbors—to step up.
Your support is critical to ensuring that everyone in New Haven has the opportunity to access basic needs.
Join me today in giving to DESK. Step up to the need that is facing us on our streets. Together, we can ensure that we will someday end hunger and homelessness with compassionate and proven strategies. Donate online at deskct.org/stepup.
And thank you as always!
Yours in service,
P.S. Are you in a position to give through retirement savings, securities, or planned giving? Learn more about how you can be part of DESK’s Legacy Society at deskct.org/legacy.
At DESK, we’re all about partnerships—whether with our guests, neighbors, nonprofits, faith-based organizations, local schools, colleges, or the business community in Greater New Haven. Partnerships are the cornerstone of our organization and allow us to continue to go above and beyond when serving people experiencing homelessness or living in poverty by providing food assistance and services that promote health, community, and equity.
Today, we take a moment to highlight our fantastic partnership with Liberty Bank! Many of you may recognize them for their passionate commitment to improving the lives of their customers, teammates, and communities since 1825. At DESK, we truly appreciate how they have embraced and continue to fulfill their mission alongside us.
DESK is grateful for Liberty Bank’s ongoing support of our Dinner Program. More than a third of New Haven’s residents face food insecurity each year. DESK helps individuals and families with chronic hunger, while also connecting them to a range of additional services that can assist with related needs, such as housing, financial stability, and overall health and well-being.
In addition to providing funding, Liberty Bank joyfully collaborates with the organization in many other meaningful ways throughout the year. They host food and clothing drives and eagerly volunteer at our various sites.
Interested in getting involved by hosting a food drive or donating food? Email donate@deskct.org for more information. Interested in volunteering? Email volunteer@deskct.org for more information.
This year’s Breaking Bread Dinner brought together 175 guests from across Greater New Haven, including elected officials, business leaders, community partners, volunteers, staff, clients, and Board members. The event served to celebrate the community-based organization’s recent accomplishments while raising critical funds, the importance of which has been underscored by federal cuts to social services and public health programs that threaten to worsen the housing crisis, widespread food insecurity, and ongoing opioid crisis, as highlighted throughout the evening
For over 30 years, DESK has partnered with Yale Hospitality to provide food for their dinner program year-round and support the annual Thanksgiving for All program. In 2017, Yale Hospitality began hosting the Breaking Bread Dinner; together, they have built up and expanded the event, culminating this year with the most dollars raised to date. Today, proceeds from the fundraiser account for about ten percent of DESK’s total annual budget.
“We are so grateful to Yale Hospitality and Yale’s Divinity School for hosting Breaking Bread this year,” said DESK’s Executive Director Steve Werlin. “It is precisely these sorts of committed, long-term relationships between Yale and community-based organizations that generate real, added value to New Haven and support those who are most in need at the grassroots level.”
This year also marked the first time the event was held at the Old Refectory and highlighted the long-time partnership between Yale’s Divinity School and DESK, who has hosted YDS interns for the past six years. Dean Gregory E. Sterling delivered the welcoming address and led attendees in the ceremonial breaking of the bread. “Community-based organizations like DESK play a critical role in training the next generation of civic and faith leaders,” said Sterling, highlighting the natural connection between the divinity school’s public service component and DESK’s values.
Bruce Barber of WNPR and WNHU, the master of ceremonies, kept the evening light and entertaining. Sommelier James Todeasa and Yale Hospitality’s Executive Chef and Director of Culinary Excellence James Benson described the efforts and considerations that went into creating the dinner experience in great detail.
Additionally, DESK’s Executive Director thanked guests, volunteers, clients, and Board members in attendance and highlighted Center Church on the Green’s support of DESK over the past 38 years. “This past year, DESK left the nest. When we finished the renovations at 266 State Street, we moved out of Center Church’s Parish House altogether, but they continue to honor and support our longstanding partnership.” To commemorate their support, the Ladies Home Missionary Society of Center Church on the Green matched all donations received during the event dollar-for-dollar up to $20,000. The match was met and surpassed before the evening was over.
As social service providers face unprecedented defunding to critical programs at the federal level, DESK is calling upon all members of our community to support grassroots organizations like DESK that are serving our neighbors who are most in need. Those who can support DESK should visit deskct.org/financial-contributions, or sign up to volunteer at deskct.org/volunteer.
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Downtown Evening Soup Kitchen (DESK) is a New Haven-based nonprofit that serves people experiencing homelessness and living in poverty by providing food assistance and services that promote health, community, and equity. Since 1987, (DESK) has supported people experiencing homelessness in New Haven by providing meals and other basic needs. Over the last 38 years, we have expanded continually to meet the growing need in New Haven.
In April 2021, DESK opened New Haven’s first low-barrier Downtown Drop-in & Resource Center, where our staff and volunteers connect unhoused people with not only basic needs, but also additional support services — like shelter, housing, medical care, mental health and addiction services, and employment — designed to move them beyond homelessness and poverty.
In 2024, we further expanded by adding peer-supported outreach staff who can literally meet people where they are, physically and emotionally. DESK’s growth in recent years reflects both the overwhelming need in our community, as well as our determination to fulfill our mission by addressing the changing needs of those we serve in creative, progressive, and high-impact ways.
