Looking Glass Community Services

The 5th annual “Socktoberfest” sock donation drive that runs the month of October each year, was a smashing success this year thanks to the generosity of community members and drive corporate sponsors. More than 20,000 pairs of socks came through, more than double the prior year’s haul! Socks are a crucial necessity for unhoused individuals and the New Roads staff often runs out of socks to hand out during the year so this annual drive has become very important.

Finding affordable, safe, quality housing is a challenge for a lot of people in Eugene and broader Lane County, but especially so for youth with limited rental history and sometimes criminal history. So it is particularly special to Looking Glass when a local community member agrees to long-term rental partnerships. Austin Folnagy is the most recent example of a willing and supportive landlord who enthusiastically embraces the opportunity to rent an entire complex to Looking Glass youth.

“It’s a way to give back, for sure,” Folnagy explained. “It’s a business, for sure, but by working with Looking Glass in this way, it’s a way to do good in our community too.”

Employees from Moss Adams provided some community service helpers to various Eugene-area nonprofits on Friday, July 14th, including Looking Glass where they did some landscaping cleanup work at New Roads and Station 7.

New Roads homeless youth drop-in center (off 7th and Blair Blvd) has a clothing closet for youth clients ages 16 to 21. At this time, the shelves containing clothing for male-identifying youth are quite bare. Looking Glass is seeking donations of clothing in a variety of sizes including pants, shirts, shorts, socks as well as shoes of various sizes.

Thanks in part to a capacity building grant awarded from Lane County (via HUD) in 2022, Looking Glass New Roads homeless youth program has expanded both its outreach team and operating hours for the drop-in center located on 7th Avenue in Eugene. The outreach team doubled in size from a staff of 4 to staff of 8 and New Roads went from providing services Monday-Friday 8:30 to 5 to now offering 7-day-a-week services from 8:30AM to 8:30PM.

Members of the Southtowne Rotary group assembled a new animal kennel and installed it at New Roads homeless youth drop-in center after New Roads staff requested help corralling the various pets that youth tend to bring in. Rotarians Lonny and Jantzen built the 5-unit kennel and installed it in the first week of January.

The 4th annual Socktoberfest sock donation drive resulted in thousands of pairs of donated socks for New Roads homeless youth program. The October-long donation drive included donation locations at all Lane County area Bi-Marts, local Windermere offices, Macy’s at Valley River Center, Heritage Bank NW, all PeaceHealth hospital locations locally and also a special drive done by the UO Softball team.

Looking Glass New Roads Program, which provides support and basis needs to homeless youth ages 16-21, has started offering a weekly Narcotics Anonymous meeting every Thursday from 1-2pm at New Roads School and hopes to create more awareness of this offering to any teen who has interest in attending. Anyone under the age of 21 can attend, no sign up needed. Angela Day, the on-site therapist at New Roads, runs the meetings, which started in February. Day said she is unaware of any such meetings being offered elsewhere in Lane County for youth but thinks the need is significant.

Looking Glass’ New Roads School Teacher, Dane Eckweiler, who started at the school for homeless youth clients of New Roads drop-in center in January of 2022, has always enjoyed helping people, particularly the challenge of helping youth who require a little more creativity in their academic approach. In early months on the job, Dane is enjoying the flexibility to help the students he works with to learn at their own pace and find subjects that interest them to help spark that passion for learning needed to keep going in the face of so many other life challenges.

The 3rd annual Socktoberfest sock drive was once again a tremendous success, generating thousands of pairs of new and gently used socks for homeless youth at New Roads. Donation locations around Lane County included Bi-Mart, Macy’s at Valley River Center, Windermere Real Estate offices, Columbia Bank branches, and PeaceHealth.