Reclaiming Our Greatness is a non-profit based in Renton. We serve the BIPOC communities of King County. We are currently partnered with King County Best Starts for Kids as part of their Youth and Families Homelessness Prevention Initiative as well as the Department of Commerce’s Washington State Homelessness Diversion Program. These are two of the programs in the current suite of services we are able to provide our clients.
We are writing specifically about a gap in services that exists for individuals and families, especially those currently experiencing homelessness. While the BSK-YFHPI program offers housing stability/rental assistance to people on the brink of homelessness, it does little to address the need for help with move-in costs for those individuals. Nor does it serve the homeless community. The DOC program does provide assistance with move-in costs, but funding is currently limited. In order for our organization to stretch our allocation through the end of the year, we are only able to distribute $6,000/mo to help individuals. Hopefully, in the next calendar year that amount will increase
The current crisis we face is the overwhelming community need for help with move-in costs. The people reaching out are low-income and/or homeless. They reach out when they’ve been approved for housing but lack the funds to pay deposits and first/last month’s rent in order to move in. The resources for these individuals and families are very limited. When we are not able to assist, we do make referrals to other organizations but there are few that offer move-in cost assistance. We can’t imagine the frustration, fear and sense of hopelessness these people experience; to be on the brink of securing a home but not having the means to meet the substantial initial costs to move in.
To date, we have experienced nearly 100 requests for assistance in the month of July alone. Twenty-five people have already reached out this morning. This is an issue that is going to continue to impact these people. Move-in costs are substantial given current rental rates. Some of the cost burden might be relieved by the lower rent and deposit rates of low-income housing, but there still exists a substantial one-time financial commitment. Even individuals with vouchers are impacted. Vouchers do not cover move-in costs.
We implore your office to explore establishing additional funding opportunities for King County partners to provide move-in cost assistance. The fight to reduce homelessness must include the ability of the low-income and homeless communities to meet these costs.
The Black Community Building Collective is a coalition of 15 Black-led organizations brought together by United Way of King County to build relationships, form strategies that impact the Black community and implement those strategies with United Way funding that cedes decision-making power to communities. The Collective launched in 2020 to invest $3 million in local, Black-led organizations. We’ve invested an additional $1.5 million in 2022 and we anticipate more funding in later years.
United Way features monthly spotlights of Collective members. This month, we’re spotlighting Reclaiming Our Greatness, a Seattle area-based organization that creates transformative outcomes for youth and families with case management and resource development. The organization serves more than 150 people annually with those services and thousands more through rental assistance outreach. We spoke with Reclaiming Our Greatness founder Marshaun Barber to learn more.
United Way of King County: What are the origins of Reclaiming Our Greatness?
Marshaun Barber: My background is that I was a civil legal aid attorney for TeamChild [a legal advocacy program for youth] for three and a half years. I’ve always been heavily involved with young people and advocacy and trying to make their lives better with the resources that are available. During my career at TeamChild I did a lot of work with juveniles that were faced with being tried as adults.
I just kept noticing that the folks who knew how to navigate the education and housing systems to meet their basic needs had better outcomes. In 2019, I decided to leave the legal practice full time and start Reclaiming Our Greatness. We got our first work in the housing stability arena; our first contract was with United Way working with kids who had multiple moves during the school year and using case management and potentially access to some type of rental assistance support to create more stability.
United Way of King County: How did you scale your work from there?
Marshaun Barber: Having that success [with United Way] we were able to do work with the Emergency Rental Assistance Program in King County and provide outreach assistance and application completion assistance with landlords. During 2020, we had a partnership with Holgate Street Church of Christ and Seattle Public Schools to provide in-person learning support for 39 African American students furthest from educational [opportunities] in Seattle Public Schools. We also provided housing and case management support for those families.
United Way of King County: And Reclaiming Our Greatness recently launched a partnership with your alma mater, Seattle University School of Law. What does that entail?
Marshaun Barber: It’s a family law partnership: We bring Seattle University the clients–primarily Black and BIPOC members of the community who would never have access to legal representation–in the arenas of domestic violence protection orders, first-time dissolution, child support and parenting plan access.
United Way of King County: Where did you come up with the name, “Reclaiming Our Greatness”?
Marshaun Barber: I wanted something that was positive and elevated Black and brown people. Usually when you’re talking about helping people or working with people that need these services and assistance, often they are cast in a negative light. Black and brown people are already great. We already know that. So, I was looking for a name that elevated our greatness and our resilience. And I wanted to honor the fact that there are good things already here, but with help and advocacy we can continue to do great things, make a meaningful impact and create an overall experience that people who work with our agency never forget.
United Way of King County: What does it mean to be part of the Black Community Building Collective?
Marshaun Barber: I’m able to connect with this amazing group of Black leaders; it’s the first time for me to feel supported in this work. I don’t have a historical background in running a nonprofit. I have ideas about where we need to elevate community, particularly Black community in King County who are struggling to maintain their housing and the move to push them out further south. Juggling all those things but also getting the support from other Black leaders who’ve had nonprofits and been leading them longer has been very valuable and monumental for me.
The support through [Black Community Building Collective] funding has allowed me to increase my staff, and it’s led to the launch of multiple programs. Now we are also officially a part of King County under Best Starts for Kids and the Youth and Family Homelessness Prevention Initiative. We provide [families] with rent, stabilization resources and ongoing case management to address some of the other issues impacting their ability to remain stable.
United Way of King County: You’ve made significant strides for an organization launched right before COVID.
Marshaun Barber: Actually, our organization was founded in 2019, but we didn’t get our first contract finalized (and started the work) until August 2020. We are busy right now, growing, expanding and trying to take up space at certain tables to advocate for the allocation of funds for Black and BIPOC community members. And we are trying to walk alongside those groups to help make their overall experience better and help them get stabilized, so they don’t have to utilize these programs long-term and [thus] break up this generational history of lifelong poverty.
Last July, during a State of Black Student Genius meeting with Seattle Public Schools’ Superintendent Denise Juneau, community leaders and members of the Holgate Street Church of Christ heard about some of the challenges that Central District elementary school children were having with virtual learning.
It only took a few weeks for volunteers, mostly from the church, and other organizations to spring into action to help the students get their education back on track. The racial disparities in education that were already present before the pandemic were exacerbated by the crisis, and the community felt it was important for the children to receive the support they needed.
Marshaun Barber, executive director of, which supports families who are experiencing housing and food insecurity, said Holgate’s minister Jimmy Hurd offered a place to provide tutoring for the children, many of whom have special needs. United Way of King County partners with ROG, a Black-led, community-based organization, as part of its homelessness prevention efforts.
Barber said a combination of about 18 members of the congregation and other paid staff offers in-person, remote learning assistance as well as math, reading and social-emotional support for the 40 children who are in the program—39 students are Black and one is Latina.
All volunteers and staff members who contribute to this initiative are Black, so the children have the support of people who look like them and love them. They provide a high level of assistance that is generally not available to the students in a traditional setting, and particularly when it comes to remote learning.
“We’ve had students who were essentially failing when they first started the program who, by the end of the first semester, were able to raise their grades to B’s.”
Marshaun Barber, Reclaiming Our Greatness
“This program basically came out of just sitting in a virtual town hall and listening to community voices about what they needed and some of the challenges they faced when we went to remote learning,” Barber said. “I was in that conversation because we’re really big about honoring community voice and honoring community resilience.”
Barber added that, to ensure everyone’s health, there are temperature checks and social distance is maintained.
Barber said the program is already yielding positive results.
“We’ve had students who have entered the fourth grade, but they’re really reading and doing math at a first-grade level and not being able to do the curriculum or work with staff,” said Barber. “We’ve had students who were essentially failing when they first started the program who, by the end of the first semester, were able to raise their grades to B’s,” said Barber.
But it is the community that has made a difference for the children.
“The staff is what really makes the program run because it is a labor of love,” Barber added. “With some of those kids having higher needs than other others, it takes a community effort. And folks from the community have been really stepping up.”
“Community folks come in and nurture the children’s social-emotional learning. Students participate in yoga, meditation and physical activity. They also have discussions around instilling resilience and leadership and that they can learn, especially during these challenging times,” Barber said.
Barber said parents have been grateful for the program because many of them were having a difficult time juggling the remote learning schedule and having access to the right technology so their children could meaningfully participate in their education.
“Some say that if it weren’t for the program, they wouldn’t even be engaging in their children’s education,” Barber said. “They’re also grateful for the daily feedback they get from the adults who work with the students because, in the traditional setting, they often did not get that.”
Barber said most students are enrolled in Seattle Public Schools, but they also have students who are enrolled in the Highline public school district. One family has a child that comes from the Auburn school district to participate.
“We’re just trying to be accommodating of the community need wherever there’s a need. We try to fulfill it,” Barber said.
Barber said many of the volunteers are retired teachers, and ROG has two staff members working in the program. She added that Therapeutic Health Services, which provides additional support in the community, funds a recent early childhood education graduate to aid the students.
Glover Empower Mentoring, a community-based organization in Kent, also partnered with Reclaiming Our Youth to provide weekly social, emotional-learning activities for the students in the program.
Siemer Institute, a national organization that focuses on stabilizing families’ housing challenges, funds Reclaiming Our Greatness’ homelessness prevention goals.
“Without Siemer’s support, we wouldn’t be able to do this community work and support children and families, which is my passion and the community’s passion, too,” Barber said.
