Sharon Lee Harkey owns and operates Purple Shark Transcriptions, a transcription company dedicated to providing high-quality transcripts for a variety of industries and uses. She shares one of her favorite New York City charity organizations with us below.

Community Access is a wonderful organization that I am very pleased to be able to tell you all about.

A devastating investigative journalism report by Geraldo Rivera in the late 1960s shown a spotlight on the appalling conditions inside the Willowbrook State School and other psychiatric hospitals in New York State. This led to an emptying of those facilities by the state in the early 1970s. The problem was that while there were advocates to abolish those institutions, the other part of the equation – finding better places for the patients to live, as well as providing them the care they needed – was ignored. As a result, tens of thousands of psychiatric patients became homeless.

Community Access was begun in 1974 to address the problems that these people faced. Providing housing, training, medical attention and other social services to this too often ignored population, as well as to people living with other disabilities and with AIDS, Community Access is only a part of the answer that the government failed to deliver – but it’s one of the best groups around that has picked up this piece of the puzzle. In their own words:

Community Access is internationally recognized as one of the most innovative providers of transitional and supportive housing for people living with mental illness. We have expanded beyond housing to include support services, job training, and a fine arts program to meet the needs of individuals and families. Tenants and consumers of our housing and services include people living with HIV/AIDS, low-income families, veterans, and individuals who had previously been incarcerated. Our award-winning programs have been replicated across the country. Community Access is recognized as a leader in providing comprehensive services and housing to a diverse population.

One last thing – for years, getting a ride home from work every night, I passed a derelict but wonderful old building near the FDR Drive. Unique in architecture, clearly very old and sadly abandoned, I often wished I could do something about it – and then one day I opened up an annual report from Community Access and discovered that they had purchased the property and were about to begin to rehabilitate it! So I love them for saving this beautiful building – it’s the Governeur Court in Manhattan, completed in 1994 and housing approximately 123 people. You can visit their website and see what other wonderful rehabilitations they’ve done and the very necessary work they continue to do – intelligently, compassionately and humanely.

To donate $1 to Community Access to help provide continued support for people in New York City living with psychiatric disabilities, click here. Please use “One Dollar Give” in the dedication portion of the donation form. For more information on how you can purchase a “Good Card” to help minimize transaction fees deducted from your donations, click here. After you’ve donated, come back and vote in the poll so that we can count donations!

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(Yes, the poll offers you the choice between “Yes.” and “Yes.” because I didn’t think we really needed to count the “No” answers, and the poll required two choices! Hey, it’s not a perfect system, but it’ll work!)