Thankful Thursday: Heeja Martinez
“When you are on the level of just trying to survive, and feel safe, have a place - shelter - you know, there’s not room for thinking of a lot of other things. Moving here, that need for shelter and safety is taken care of. Living here has helped me to be confident in knowing that I cannot worry so much, and that I can do other things. I feel that I do have a stable environment, and I am able more-so to get involved and even open myself up to reaching out to other people.”
Heeja, her spouse, and their four children, moved into RCFL housing on October 17, 2010, the day they moved out of the shelter, Mary’s Place, and the day that Heeja and Tacho got married at the courthouse in downtown Minneapolis.
“I feel like more-so my goals are attainable now. And that’s something that living here has helped me with; because I’ve had a stable place to live, I am more able to be emotionally present for my kids, and more able to spend quality time with them. It’s also been easier to stay at my job, and like I have the capacity to go somewhere else and do the kind of work that I want to be doing and support the organizations that I want to.”
For Heeja, affordable, accessible, housing in a supportive community has translated into greater overall stability for herself, her family, her work; housing stability translates into the ability to be present, to grow and to dream.
Thank you, Heeja, for investing, engaging, and being present with us.
Join us as we invest in and celebrate North Minneapolis. Be present with us, grow with us: https://www.redeemercenter.org/donate
We’ll see you again, right here, as we embark on a regular journey of diving deeper into the workings of the Redeemer community, who we are, how we engage, and just how we together evolve.
As a place based organization, we celebrate and reinforce the diversity of Minneapolis’s Northside through social action and investment in its people, ideas, and enterprises. Community engagement remains at the core of our organizational culture and the primary source for our vision, strategy and evolution.
The support and partnership provided by monetary donations of all sizes, volunteerism, and in-kind contributions enable us to continue to act as an agent of hope and transformation to preserve a vibrant community in the Harrison neighborhood and broader North Minneapolis.
