Rita’s Work Shelter Guide

The Rita’s Work Shelter Guide is a platform that assists first responders and shelter staff in providing critical services to the community. This application connects domestic violence shelters and first responders to help survivors get needed emergency shelter quickly and efficiently. This app is designed to make it quicker and easier to help first responders help find emergency shelter for survivors.

In this webinar, you will get an introduction to why and how the Rita’s Work Shelter Guide was created, how it works, and how it can benefit shelters, first responders, survivor advocates, and most importantly, survivors of domestic violence themselves. The developers are specifically looking for Bay Area programs to participate in a Pilot Project.

Webinar Hosts:

Amanda Gibson

Amanda Gibson is a licensed clinical social worker and an independent professional counselor with 15 years of experience. She treats adults and families in the areas of child welfare, domestic violence, trauma, chronic health, and mental health and wellness. She the Founder and CEO of Counseling Col:lab in Sacramento California. Counseling Col:lab provides a collaborative space where therapists of all different backgrounds come together to serve the Sacramento area. 
While earning her master’s in social work at USC, Amanda served as the program director at Good Shepherd Shelter in Los Angeles from 2003-2006. In January of 2014, she returned to serve at the Shelter as the Director of Clinical Programs and Operations after working in Sacramento in mental health. 
In addition to her extensive clinical skills, Amanda has always integrated self-care into each agency she has been a part of and as a result has led very successful teams who provide high quality, efficient services, with low rates of burn out and staff turnover.

 Kathleen Buczko

Kathleen Buczko is a nonprofit consultant and strategist with a specialty in fundraising and organizational leadership. She has served in a variety of capacities for LA-based nonprofits, including the City’s oldest domestic violence shelter, Good Shepherd Shelter. Prior to joining Good Shepherd Shelter as director of development, Kathleen used her extensive brand marketing and sales expertise to transform education through a project of the Specialty Family Foundation, the Catholic Schools Consortium. This pilot project seeks to build on the centuries of success of Catholic education in the United States in building pathways out of poverty for immigrant families - providing new horizons, skills and confidence to succeed. While with the CSC, she formed the first collaborative efforts with joint programming and fundraising to ensure that the capacity investment lasted from the smallest to the most stable urban Catholic elementary schools. 
Prior to beginning her career in development, Kathleen guided some of the world’s largest brands with innovative counsel and programs. With stints in telecommunications, energy, utilities, healthcare, packaged goods and franchising giants, her truly unique career spans from social justice initiatives to selling beer, positioning nuclear power plants and launching balloons in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade. Her clients span from the top consumer brands and to behind the scenes players in technology. Her background in engineering and science coupled with her media experience provides a combination that is unrivaled by the competition. Her work with Epson and HP, created the digital imaging consumer category with innovative programs for photography, creativity and ink jet technology -- and one of the first corporate blogs in 1996! She is a recognized leader in positioning and branding serves on several corporate and community boards. Most recently, she was recognized by Bulldog Reporter for her work in the non-profit research and development space. 
Kathleen received her bachelor’s degree in communications from Wayne State University and began her career as a news writer/producer at WDIV-TV, an NBC affiliate, Detroit, Michigan, and is returning to her roots in the media as creator and executive producer and host of “The Dots” a weekly podcast interviewing artists, community and business leaders about success and making their communities a better place. She is currently at work on a new book about work, life, mission and achieving goals, called Connecting the Dots: a handbook for change. She has appeared on several media outlets including, The Real, Los Angeles Times and the Huffington Post.

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Questions?
If you have additional questions regarding the webinar, please contact Miranda Stiers, Capacity-Building Program Specialist.