Helping Restoration, Helping Your Community, Helping You

If you could help a young father get the training he needs to find a job and support his family, would you?

If you could help a hard working high school student make her dream of a college education a reality, would you?

If you could empower a single mother to become economically independent and save for her future, and her children’s future, would you?

If you could nurture artistic talent found in the most unlikely of places, would you?

If you could transform an inner city community into a benchmark for environmental sustainability and healthy living would you?

For the past 44 years, Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation has answered “yes”, providing a critical safety net of services to Central Brooklyn families ranging from social supports, benefits, job training and placement, and weatherization assistance to educational enrichment and artistic development. We’ve said “yes” so that your neighbors can get the help they need during these challenging economic times. We’ve said yes so that a generation of Central Brooklyn youth can have a brighter future. We’ve said yes so that struggling households can preserve their most valuable asset, their home. We’ve said yes because we know that people living in inner city communities like ours deserve clean air, public green space and energy efficient homes too.

Restoration places 200 people in jobs and internships annually and offers a host of training opportunities from the national job readiness credential to green sector training resulting in OSHA certification. Removing barriers to employment, Restoration provides access to benefits, free legal and financial counseling, and case management, helping 760 families, securing over 1 million dollars in annual cash benefits.

“We came to Restoration after having gone to other human resource offices and no one did anything that actually helped. Restoration staff helped me avoid eviction by finding assistance with rental arrears and I was able to speak with a lawyer about my immigration status. They also helped me find a job and made me aware that my family qualified for food stamps.”
-Laila Sadni Ziane

Restoration’s College Access Center served 70 high school students last year, helping 100% of our seniors graduate and 88% successfully enroll into college. Restoration is currently providing intensive college prep, counseling and wrap around supports to students at Boys and Girls High School.

“If it weren’t for Restoration’s College Access Center, I wouldn’t be in college right now. My high school advisors did not have the knowledge Restoration staff had. They were mentors to me and walked me through everything I needed to do to get me to where I am today.”
-Lisbeth DPichardo, SUNY New Paltz Freshman

Restoration is committed to creating a greener, healthier Bedford Stuyvesant for everyone. We’ve weatherized 1,000 low income homes in the past year, helping reduce energy costs and improve living conditions. Complementing these efforts, Restoration’s partnership on the Retrofit Bed Stuy Block by Block is creating model green blocks with free energy audits, retrofits and newly planted trees. Nearing its completion, the ambitious, multi-year redesign of Restoration Plaza is not only transforming our historic plaza into a premiere destination for community programming, commerce and the arts but has incorporated new public green-space and energy efficient technology.

"The partnership with Retrofit Bed Stuy Block by Block has helped us to revitalize and strengthen our Block Association…This Program is bigger than the energy assessment; it is about gaining a sense of what is going on in your own home, knowing what needs to be done, and having an awareness that is priceless.”
-Richelle Burnett, Homeowner, Block Association President

In the coming year, Restoration will continue to say “yes” to an ambitious educational agenda that prioritizes our children, to an environmental platform that continues to transform our community into a benchmark for sustainability and healthy living, and to economic programming that enhances self sufficiency and family stability. We ask that you say “yes” too, and support Restoration as we drive a bold spectrum of programming in the year ahead designed to improve the quality of life for Central Brooklyn families.

Sincerely,

Colvin W. Grannum
President and CEO