How Entertainment Workers Are Finding New Careers in Homeless Services — With a Little Help From Keanu Reeves
Take Monica Tracey. The former production manager for NBC and The Asylum recently completed a five-day intensive training program with Los Angeles Unhoused Response Academy, or LAURA — and is already putting her problem-solving experience to work with a street medicine organization.
With over 75,000 unhoused people in Los Angeles County alone, the situation remains dire, and it's proved very challenging to find enough case managers and housing navigators to help unhoused people move into housing and get crucial medical care.
Enter LAURA (Los Angeles Unhoused Response Academy) — a five-day training program that seeks to connect people changing careers with a fast-track path to becoming a case manager or another position in the homeless services area. LAURA isn't only for those transitioning out of entertainment, but several people in the first group of fellows were exploring new careers beyond TV and film, where they worried opportunities have all but dried up.
The pilot week last October was backed by Keanu Reeves, who knew LAURA founder Justin Szlasa from when they worked on the documentary 'Side by Side' together.
The second LAURA cohort of 10 participants will start April 10, this time with backing from the United Way.
Szlasa, currently a commissioner with the county's housing board LAHSA, joined the program's sponsor Future Communities after being on the board of the SELAH homeless outreach organization, which has become a springboard for several former industry creatives to move into social services and politics.
'In terms of frontline workers, about 8,000 work in homeless services and there's about 2,000 open spots. There's a lot of unfilled need, with a 30% attrition annually,' says Szlasa.
Of the six participants in the pilot program, which focused on Downtown L.A.'s Skid Row, five were offered full-time jobs and four are already working, Szlasa reports. The goal is to run five sessions a year, with at least two in Hollywood, where he sees a strong need.
During the program, people from agencies and organizations that provide housing, medical care, addiction services and other areas lead tours and briefings on their specialties, giving participants a quick but intensive course in how the byzantine homeless services system works. With increasing scrutiny on accountability for the many organizations receiving public funding, it's crucial they recruit enough trained workers to get people efficiently housed and treated.
Tracey started volunteering with SELAH after observing the scope of homelesness in the city. 'It's so prevalent here, in L.A. you cannot escape it,' she says. 'So that kind of did tug on my heartstrings. And then with the way the business has been, it's been awful this past year.'
After completing the LAURA program, Tracey was hired by Akido Labs' Street Medicine team as a lead care manager. Tracey has a caseload of 30 Skid Row-area patients dealing with mental health and substance abuse issues in addition to other health issues. She also helps her clients move to the next step to obtaining temporary or permanent housing.
It's not entirely different from managing the many challenges of a big production — except that the issues are life and death instead of whether the director got the wrong lunch delivered. 'I've always been pretty good in crazy situations, and I love putting out fires,' Tracey says. 'And now, this is real life.'
'I'm making a lot less,' she admits, but sighs, 'Television is really changing now.'
Another participant in LAURA's pilot program, filmmaker Adam Assad, worked in the art department on various productions and is still deciding whether a career in entertainment will be viable. 'Obviously filmmaking has always been a dream, but this is more of a rewarding line of work,' he says. 'So if it's something I can make work permanently, that would be the goal.' But the salaries in social services are a roadblock, Assad says, so for now he's working for L.A.'s Metro transit agency.
'When you first start, the salaries are very low,' Szlasa admits, 'but they can move up relatively quickly.' He'd like to find funding to help bridge that gap and make it more feasible for people to enter the profession, particularly for those used to higher salaries.
'It's been a struggle,' says Assad, describing the one-two-three punch of the pandemic, strikes and streaming companies producing less. But that pause gave him time to volunteer in homeless services and start thinking about other careers.
'I always thought I can't be a case manager because I don't have a degree in social work or whatever. And it's like, no, you can do this and we can help you. You can link up with people who are hiring right now,' Assad says.
It's going to take a lot of effort to solve the homeless crisis in Los Angeles, but programs like LAURA can bridge gaps in the system — and maybe open up new career paths at the same time.
(Pictured above: LAURA program leaders Justin Szlasa, left, and Dr. Julie Hudman, far right, visit Homeboy Industries with the first class of LAURA Fellows.)
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