14 January 5-11, 2023 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER Classified | MusiC | dish | Culture | unfair Park | Contents Month XX–Month XX, 2014 dallasobserver.com DALLAS OBSERVER | CLASSIFIED | MUSIC | DISH | MOVIES | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | FEATURE | SCHUTZE | UNFAIR PARK | CONTENTS | homeless population has been in foster care.” Several organizations cite this statistic, but pinning down the number is difficult. In Texas, 1,277 young people aged out of foster care last year, according to state data. According to the Texas Education Agency, 62.6% of students in foster care graduate from high school, compared with 90% of all other students. The Simmons Foundation found that female foster youths are almost five times more likely to become pregnant compared with other Texas teens. There were three speakers at that CASA meeting, all for- merly in the foster care system. The first account was pain- ful to hear; the next two were no better. “It kept getting worse,” Reihani says. He spent the next two weeks learning everything he could about foster care in the U.S. He delved into the Child Protective Services system and how foster parents are recruited — some- times, with banners hanging on fences promising $1,000 extra a month. “That’s how we’re finding foster parents,” he says. Then Reihani examined the life of CPS workers. He found that many choose the career because they want to make a change in the lives of young people but they end up getting swamped with case files and become drained be- cause they can’t make any real change. “And they’re getting paid shit,” he adds. According to the state’s Family and Protective Services database, the average yearly salary in Dallas County for CPS caseworkers is just over $53,000. In 2021, the turnover rate for CPS investigations workers was a stunning 41%, up from 27% in 2020. “The more you go into it, the more you realize it’s a deep dark hole. So much fucked-up shit going on, it doesn’t make sense. And so I’m thinking, how is this happening? How the fuck is this happening in America?” In Texas, foster youths are “emancipated” or “aged out” on their 18th birthday. Texas offers some transitional living ser- vices for foster kids until they are 25 years old. Money is avail- able for living expenses and even free college tuition through the state college tuition waiver. But many kids don’t know about the programs, and navigating the paperwork is a challenge. A Texas State University study found that about 3,000 foster youths use the tuition waivers each year, or about 10% of the total number of young adults it’s available to. Sarah Worthington is the director of Texas Foster Youth Justice Project, a nonprofit that helps current and former foster kids understand their legal rights. The group also helps sort out basic paperwork to allow young people to get started in life. “One very common challenge for youths who aged out of foster care face involves their identification documents,” Worthington says. “Texas law requires that all youths aging out of care have their birth certificate, Social Security card and Texas ID or driver’s license, but many either don’t have these documents when they exit care or they lose them and have massive difficulties replacing them. Without ID, they are unable to access safe and stable employment. Similarly, many young adults also struggle to obtain safe housing, which makes it difficult to get and keep a job.” Free college could seemingly solve many problems, but Worthington points out that it comes down to a hierarchy of needs, “If they have somewhere to live, if they have a job, yeah, they can go to school, but if those needs aren’t met, they’re much less likely to utilize the tuition waiver.” Seeing the hurdles in the path out of foster care inspired Reihani to create the We Are One Project as a “tool for busi- nesses to come together to employ foster youth,” he says. The initial focus was on therapy, housing, education and mentorship. But what he found was that these young adults couldn’t get and keep a good job. “When we first launched, it was a tornado. I thought we were going to come in and solve a problem pretty simply and that just wasn’t the reality. I’m a delusional person,” Reihani says with a laugh. “It was only Band-Aids.” So, Reihani created La La Land Kind Cafe to provide fos- ter kids jobs. He landed on the coffee shop concept because it’s typi- cally an easy-going, communal environment. Plus the job isn’t too difficult and has no significant barriers to entry. Af- ter being interviewed and hired, interns start out making $10 an hour, with a focus on learning how to help run a busy cof- fee shop and to become part of an organization. At the same time, the interns receive other services as needed through the We Are One Project, which is funded by the coffee shop. Jesberger, the CASA advocate who invited Reihani to that initial meeting, says they’re also learning important lessons that they may not have learned at home. “That’s where he [Reihani] comes in and does that train- ing. It’s such a gift,” she says. “He says, ‘On time is late,’ stuff a normal parent would probably teach a child, but they weren’t born into that so they don’t know that your clothes are expected to be clean and under your fingernails needs to be clean when you’re working with food.” The first La La Land Kind Cafe opened off Lower Green- ville Avenue in 2019. Reihani hired 10 former foster youths to work in the cafe but quickly realized that was bad for both store operations and the employees. It didn’t allow for enough individual focus. “We had to really hone in on the training. We couldn’t ex- pect them to come in, train for a day, then start the job,” Rei- hani says. Over several years the operation has gone through many tweaks. Now there’s an eight-week program designed to train just two former foster youths at a time. (Not every per- son working at a La La Land Kind Cafe was previously in the foster care system. Most weren’t.) The eight-week program allows new workers to focus on learning the job and social dynamics. Most then continue on with jobs at any of the La La Land Kind Cafe locations, but there’s also an option to find work elsewhere. “They can tell a director, ‘I want to work with dogs,’ and so the director will help them find a job that they’re passion- ate about,” Reihani says. Kadee Randle was one of the first foster kids to be part of the We Are One Project. She then went on to become one of the first baristas when the cafe opened. “I didn’t have much money, so they would go out of their way to help me with a deposit for my first apartment,” she says. And when her car was towed recently, they helped her out then too. “They did me a big favor and helped me pay my car note, so I was fresh and could start over. That was pretty cool.” Kathleen LaValle, the president and CEO of Dallas CASA, says programs like La La Land are vital for young adults aged out of the system because the programs provide not just em- ployment, but guidance and structure. Part of the mentor- ship includes weekly check-ins with directors and help with budgeting. “Many young people who exit the child welfare system are understandably anxious for independence,” LaValle says. “Yet, they face so many heightened risks, including incarcera- tion, substance abuse, homelessness, food insecurity, unem- ployment and even sex-trafficking victimization.” What La La Land’s program provides, La Valle says, is a sense of community and security while navigating the tran- sition to a healthy and independent lifestyle. “While the expectation is that each team member will be- come a responsible employee, this all happens in a support- ive environment where they feel they belong and are valued,” La Valle adds. A aron James of Los Angeles entered the foster care system when he was 5 years old. He was in the sys- tem for a couple of years before his grandmother was able to take him in. James, now 22, attends West Los Angeles College, where a school counselor recently con- nected him with the director at a new La La Land Kind Cafe in Santa Monica, the first location outside Texas. He was accepted into its internship program about five months ago. Now he goes to school, studying for a theater arts de- gree, while working at La La Land. His immediate goal is to transfer out of community college to a four-year school. The environment at La La Land was something he couldn’t give up after the internship, James says. “I had to stay. I love everyone, and the training and the managers are so amazing.” That’s something else to know about this cafe and the culture created there: They love love. In addition to creating the mentorship program, Reihani has created a coffee shop that is fueled by kindness. Baristas pass out as many “love yous” as they do coffee beans. Black hats for sale on the shelves at the stores are stitched with “Don’t be a Dick.” The La La Land official motto is “normalize kindness.” “At Starbucks [where James previously worked] we’d get a lot of angry customers and it was our job to make them happy with a thank you. But at La La Land we tell them ‘Oh, we love you, have a beautiful day,’ and it makes them happier,” James says. “I love the kindness motto. It’s one of my favorite things. It’s a happier environment.” In Dallas, Randle, who works at the Oak Lawn location, says Reihani is like a brother to her now — tough love and all. “When I was late to work all the time or calling in, it was him saying, ‘That’s not allowed, you can’t do that.’ I didn’t know, I thought all these people love me, they’re not going to fire me,” Randle says with a light laugh. “He was like, ‘I have to teach you a lesson, you’re gonna take a break and stuff,’” she says. “A lot of stuff doesn’t hap- pen the way I want it to happen, but he’s helped me with learning how to manage my money.” When asked about the biggest lesson Reihani has imparted to her she says, “Go the long way. Just by being kind, a lot of positive things will happen. Even if other people aren’t kind. They’ve just been a really big support system in my life for the last four years.” For Reihani, a primary goal in all of this is to create a play- book for other businesses to use. “There wasn’t someone we could go to and say, ‘Hey, let’s look at how they do it,’” he says. “And that was the point: We wanted to build a program so that when other businesses come to us we can show them how to do it.” In terms of sharing this program with other businesses, the largest retailer in America is in. “We worked with Walmart to launch a program, and are still fine-tuning to be able to fully launch this with others in the near future,” Rei- hani says. Kathy Tran Francois Reihani at the original La La Land Kind Cafe near Greenville Avenue. City of Ate from p13
