- Hi, everybody.
I'm here with one of my heroes.
And this is, how many times have I been here?
- I guess this is year number five, maybe.
- Yeah.
- Since 2009.
- And he's got the coolest thing going on,
and that's why, I visit a lot of homeless services
in cities all over, and I always keep coming back here.
And five years ago, it was probably a dream before that,
but you showed it to me five years ago.
I'm gonna get emotional, this is so cool.
So we're standing on some land
where Alan Graham from Mobile Loaves and Fishes
in Austin, Texas is building, making it happen,
community first.
- Absolutely.
- You wanna tell me about that?
- Well, it's really a 10 year dream.
It all began with our version of the tiny house movement
when we purchased a gently used RV 10 years ago
and lifted a guy up off the street.
- So the tiny house movement ain't new.
- It ain't new.
(Mark laughs)
In fact, we didn't even invent it.
- Right.
- I don't think anybody can claim the rights to that.
- So you got a guy a RV, got him off the streets.
- Bought 60 more over time,
started fantasizing about building a community
where people could come in and heal
from the ravages of living on the streets,
reconnect back to themselves,
back to community, back to family,
and really, most importantly, back to God.
- Yeah.
It's just amazing.
And besides seeing this actually happen
in such a big, tangible way,
just seeing how you've grown even on the social enterprise.
So when I visited five years ago,
you were helping our homeless friends
find creative ways of income,
of creating some kind of money.
Gotta have money in the pocket.
- Right.
- And now, you have them, teaching them how to garden.
You've got bees.
You've got, still have the trucks,
and you've got carts downtown.
Gosh, tell me about some of that.
- Well, what I learned by involving my life into their life,
and you've learned this, as well,
and all of us that are in this space have learned this,
for the overwhelming vast majority of these folks,
they are not W2 employable.
They're not now, and we're not gonna retrain them
to go get a job somewhere.
They're entrepreneurs.
But incredibly,
we're on the verge of outlawing entrepreneurialism,
as we talked about earlier, in the United States.
And so what we have done is become
the blockers and tacklers to the regulatory nightmare
of what it makes to just sell blow pops on the street.
It's legal to panhandle,
but it's not legal to sell blow pops or bottled water.
And so we've developed a micro business model
that we call ROADS, R-O-A-D-S,
which empowers people into creating money.
And right now, we released new opportunities
at South by Southwest, and our guys are averaging
20, 30 dollars an hour on these street treat carts
that you've seen in the past.
- Yeah.
Last year, did you launch last year?
- Yes, we did.
- These five years is such a blur.
You've got so much going on.
Because when I first came here, he had the food trucks,
which I'm sure you still have going out all over the city.
- Correct.
- Alan was the first person to talk to me about dignity
and giving people dignity and giving people a choice.
And he showed me this map,
which he's got in his hand, and dreams.
The map has probably changed over years.
So what are you building around here?
Tell me a little more detail of,
you've got a farm, you've got a chapel,
you've got all this stuff,
and when is it gonna happen and what do you see?
What's the end vision here?
- What you see here is a 27 acre master planned community
built around the RV community model.
We believe that there's an inherent sense of community
in the RV community.
Any RVer in the United States who's attracted to that
will tell you about that inherent sense of community.
We're in the middle of
a seven million dollar capital campaign.
We're just a couple of hundred thousand dollars
short of our goal right now,
which we plan to close in the next week or two.
We think that we'll be under construction by about June 1st
and perhaps moving people in by the end of the year
or the first of 2015.
- Wow.
- And there's all kinds of stuff here.
There's four housing models that include a part model home,
a recreational vehicle, what people call tiny houses
or what we really like to call micro homes.
- I like that better.
- And canvas sided guest cottages,
which are very expensive, very high quality tents.
And then there'll be
a giant sanctuary and hospitality center.
There'll be an operations building
with a 2,000 square foot workshop
so people can build and sell things.
There's the awesome farming operation
that you see in the background with our chickens,
and we have a rabbit operation, a tilapia fish operation,
and a honey bee operation.
- Awesome.
- The pigs and goats are coming.
- Pigs and goats are coming.
And you call it community first.
- Community first.
- So, in the housing first model,
which is the new sexy conversation,
the thing that is missing
is the tangible social interaction and community.
- Yeah.
So the foundation of what we're building on top of
is the housing first movement.
So no disrespect at all to the housing first movement.
I don't think it goes far enough.
I think we have to develop,
nationwide, not just for the homeless,
it's for you and I, brother,
a sense of community in the spaces that we live in,
because we have become so disconnected.
And so a community first--
- I'm not, man.
You see me walking around here and I'm connected.
- Yeah.
He bumped his head earlier.
(Mark laughs)
- Yeah, I know, exactly.
We need to be really connected to our neighbors
in a localized, hyper local way.
What you see in LA is that
you don't meet your neighbors until there's an earthquake.
- Yeah.
- And literally, I have not met
the people living next to me until we're standing outside
because we all gotta run out for emergency--
- And that will not happen here.
People will gravitate out of their micro homes,
come into this community center space
that you see behind us, and they'll enjoy food.
They'll enjoy fellowship.
They'll be playing games, chess, you name it.
- You're a follower of Jesus.
- Yes, absolutely.
- So you're building some chapels here?
- Yes.
- A bunch of cool little things, but it's not mandatory.
- No, absolutely not mandatory.
We welcome everybody of every faith and walk of life.
We just want people to reconnect back to their Creator.
For us, it's Christ.
That's who we know.
That's who has formed us.
And we praise you for whoever has formed you,
and we wanna create a number of micro spaces,
a number of reflectionaries around the community
that allow you to heal spiritually
as well as physically and emotionally.
- That's so awesome.
And there is a movement of the faith-based community
to put people first, because that's what Jesus would do.
- Yes.
- You know what I mean?
So you are front and center a Christ follower.
I respect that about you.
And you love everybody, and that's amazing.
This is really one of the most gorgeous programs,
if not the most gorgeous program,
that I know that's going on.
- I appreciate that, man.
- Mobile Loaves and Fishes.
I'll put a link.
He said he's a couple hundred thousand short.
Maybe you got a couple hundred thousand.
Maybe you just got a hundred.
This is a great program, highly recommend it,
and let's multiply it.
Let's multiply this and create community,
help people.
Thanks, everybody.
- Awesome.
Thanks.