Portrait of Jeny

By the end of September, the Martinez family had graduated from the STAR program and enrolled in the Family and Senior Homeless Initiative, run by Denver's Road Home. By then, Denver's Road Home was already two years into its ten-year plan and had established more than 800 new units of transitional and permanent housing — including the Crossing facility. "Denver's Road Home is about reaching out to all of our homeless," explains project manager Jamie Van Leeuwen, "and the Family and Senior Homeless Initiative is a critical piece to achieving our objectives to end homelessness as we know it in ten years. Without reaching out to our families and without reaching out to our seniors, we wouldn't be able to accomplish that."

With the help of FSHI, the Martinezes moved into a new, $900-a-month townhouse with luxuries they'd never imagined enjoying again: a TV, beds, shampoo. But housing isn't the only part of this program. Families need more support and structure to keep on the right road. Last year, Mayor John Hickenlooper had asked for 1,000 congregations in Denver to step up and help sponsor homeless families. Some religious groups are acting as both mentors and fundraisers, contributing up to 30 percent of the $1,200 cap on each family's security deposit and first month's rent. (The rest of the money comes from homeless organizations and city fundraising.) "Mayor Hickenlooper was looking for a creative way to engage the faith community on the ten-year plan to end homelessness," explains Brad Hopkins, FSHI's program director. "So many of our families are socially isolated; they don't have that social network around them, and the network they do have around them could be more of a negative presence."

The Martinez family requested that their mentor come from Victory Outreach, the church they were attending at the time. Their mentor claims he has lost all contact with the family and declines to discuss the matter further. But that hasn't yet affected the Martinezes' status in the program.

"About 77 percent of our families are doing all of their mentor program meetings," says Hopkins. "What we're asking for is seven meetings total over four to six months." So far, 333 families — including the Martinezes — have gone into FSHI. "Eighty-three percent of them are still in housing one year later," Hopkins continues. "This is just the real deal. The very core philosophy of our program is a relationship, and you can't force a relationship. There has to be that option to chose."

Sam says that even though it's been tough to get to church or meet with mentors, he and Rosy are sticking by their choice to get their act together and give their kids a better life.

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Ever since I was young, I always had this angry love for my parents. They put this family through so much, all because of an addiction they couldn't quit. This cost me my childhood and my innocence as a kid. Being a kid, you're supposed to have no worries or cares. I did. I always worried if my parents would ever come back. Or one day we would get taken away. So young, not knowing what's wrong, why are my parents fighting, why can't we go outside, just living such a life of mystery. I am not ashamed of my life, nor would I change anything for the world. It made me the person that I am today. Just at times, I wonder how it would have been like to just be normal. To have that life of a normal childhood. To not be a child with so much anger and pain in the heart and nowhere to let it out. This happens everywhere. I know I'm not the only one. There are others. I'm just one of the first to admit it.

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Jeny, who's about to turn sixteen, has no problem meeting with her mentor. She sees Judy Rowe, a retired teacher from Maryland, quite often. Jeny and Rowe were matched up by Save Our Youth, a mentoring agency that has paired adults with kids since 1993.

David Medina recently left the Crossing to work for SOY. "Kids don't have positive influences," he says. "Sometimes the things kids face these days, with a father in prison or the separation of mother and father in divorce, living with their grandparents — there's no structure in their life. They're so surrounded by what's taking place, they don't have that influence that there's something better."

Rowe, who has no children of her own, appreciates the chance to fill in where help is needed. Although she jokes that Jeny is a little too mature for her, the two frequently go out together — shopping or to Starbucks or to a museum or to eat. Both Rowe and Medina stuck by Jeny when her parents took the family from the Crossing, even though Sam and Rosy didn't let them actually see Jeny during that time.

These days, Sam and Rosy encourage Jeny to spend time with supportive adults.

When Rowe signed up for the mentoring program, she was warned that a lot of the kids have issues.