“Pregnant” and “homeless” were two words Martha Ryan was shocked to see together, especially in 1980s America, when President Ronald Reagan’s economic boom fueled the conspicuous consumption lifestyles of the Yuppies – Young Urban Professionals – and DINCs; Double-Income-No-Children couples. But the combined words described a reality. And Ryan intended to do something about it.
Ryan graduated from high school in 1967. But her motivation to act was less inspired by the hippie movement’s Summer of Love than by those who’d helped her own family through periods of poverty while growing up.
She’d joined the Peace Corps after earning a University of San Francisco degree in 1972 and spent time in Ethiopia, where she witnessed how the power of women working in community could overcome even a lack of electricity and running water.
Back in San Francisco, Ryan became an intensive care unit nurse and returned to Africa to assist for short stretches in other countries such as Sudan, Uganda and Somalia before realizing there was a unique need right in her own backyard.
In 1989, she secured a $52,000 grant and opened the Homeless Prenatal Program as a three-person clinic inside the Hamilton Family Shelter in Haight-Ashbury. Thirty-five years after those humble beginnings HPP has grown to 130 employees and a $17 million annual budget, 60 percent of which comes from municipal contracts, the remaining 40 percent from foundation grants, individual donors, and fundraisers.
Ryan didn’t foresee such scale, but as the unhoused population increased they’ve grown with it.
According to Executive Director Shellena Eskridge, evidence of the need and HPP’s response is visible every Friday morning, when hundreds of people gather outside the facility inside a former door factory at the intersection of 18th Street and Potrero Avenue to receive one of the 450 bags of food distributed weekly. Eskridge said they could always use more.
In addition to food distribution, HPP offers counseling services, parenting classes, drop in child care, wellness programs, and a 16-month paid apprenticeship which prepares graduates for employment as community health workers, many of whom now work for HPP.
“In fact,” Eskridge added, “50 percent of our employees have lived experience.”
HPP housing assistance consists of vouchers for temporary hotel stays as well as placement in the 17-bed Jelani House for pregnant and postpartum women.
“People want to succeed,” Ryan said, “but when you are born into poverty, opportunities for success are limited. That’s what we provide.”
Last year, in a city with an estimated 437 homeless families, HPP provided services to nearly 4,500 families, Ryan’s work has earned her numerous accolades, including a CNN Heroes award in 2013, and a Heroes Among Us profile in People magazine. She’s quick to insist that none of the accomplishments were hers alone, emphasizing that she’s carried on the community-based approach that first inspired her.
She’s transitioned out of overseeing day-to-day operations and focuses on being the face of HPP, allowing the new generation, led by Eskridge, to pilot work into the future. That includes planning the biggest project yet: construction of 96 affordable residences in the space presently occupied by the warehouse adjacent to their headquarters.
Jessica Zimmer 
Alina Ferguson