In 1971 Delancey Street began with four residents, a thousand dollar loan, and a dream to develop a new model to turn around the lives of substance abusers, former felons, and others who have hit bottom by empowering the people with the problems to become their own solution. More than 30 years later we remain true to our mission. We have been taking in as residents representatives of our society's most serious social problems and, by a process of each one helping another, with no professionals, no government funding, and at no charge to the clients, we have been solving these problems: generations of poverty, illiteracy, lack of job skills, hardcore substance abusers, homelessness, repeat felons, gang members, teen pregnancies, perpetrators, and victims of every kind of abuse. After an average of four years (a minimum stay of 2 years), our residents gain an academic education, three marketable skills, accountability and responsibility, dignity, and integrity...