One of my more recent projects has been getting involved with the local non-profit organization, Good Vibe Tribe. For the first campaign I worked on with them, we have been raising funds to help provide basic necessities to the people of Nickelsville, a local homeless encampment run and maintained by its residents and dedicated to helping others in need. On December 12th we will work with Mojito to put on a dinner at the encampment and are inviting hair stylists and barbers to come provide haircuts.
In an effort to inspire people to donate, Good Vibe Tribe's social media/marketing team and I headed over to Nickelsville so snap some portraits and ask them some simple questions in hopes of getting to know them better. It was kind of our little spin on "Humans of New York" and we called it "Citizens of Nickelsville." It was really lovely to meet these folks, who all had such big hearts, and the campaign certainly invigorated our fundraising efforts, with $1400 donated in that week alone.
“At the end of the day, we’re trying to save lives. We don’t want people out on the street–we don’t even like barring people from here because we just know that if they have any drug abuse issues, they’re just gonna go out there and it’s going to get worse. And it’s not going to help them any, and so we do actually look out for each other in that way, too. And that’s really important.”
“I worked in bookstores—I'm a reader, I love books. I think it gives you a good understanding of people, and it also educates you, whether you're reading fiction or not. Non-fiction, especially, educates you on understanding people—it gives you other perspectives which is always good to have.”
“This has become my family, so any free time I have, I'm building bikes. Up until earlier today, I had a shit-ton of them lined up in the alley way. I had 23 of them in my house, so that was a pain in the ass to get those out of there.”