Celina Alvarez is Executive Director of Housing Works, recognized as one of Los Angeles’ most innovative and effective homeless services providers. Ms. Alvarez has been involved with Housing Works since 2008 as part of the nationally recognized Mobile Integrated Services Team (MIST). She was mentored by Mollie Lowery, the pioneer of permanent supportive housing in Los Angeles County. Ms. Alvarez holds a Masters degree in Nonprofit Management from Antioch University and a Bachelors in Social Work from California State University Los Angeles. Prior to being tapped for leadership, she worked as a frontline homeless services worker on Skid Row.
Under Celina’s leadership, Housing Works has tripled its staff and budget along with increasing the number of people it serves by scaling services in partnership with multiple affordable housing developers, public agencies and healthcare systems. She is actively advancing Housing Works’ priorities on food justice, living wages for frontline workers, telling the stories of participants and workers, and decolonizing the workplace to create a safe space for workers and participants who are largely people of color.
Well known as an activist, innovator, and thought leader, Celina has served as an expert content advisor for Notre Dame’s Lab for Economic Opportunity, UC Berkeley’s California Policy Lab, CSH’s Social Innovation Fund Conference, as well as KCET and KPFK public radio stations. She continues to push numerous systems to improve their response to the homelessness crisis grounded in the lived experience of those living on the streets and those working most closely with them.
One effort Alvarez is particularly proud of is having partnered with Santa Monica City College to roll out a frontline worker job training program into a college curriculum aimed at developing the homeless services workforce. Two years ago, Alvarez received one of just fifteen CSH National Barrier Breaker Awards.
Speaker: Take Heart Now Series