Episode transcript
This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and readability.
From volunteer to CEO
Jaime Buxton: Have you ever looked at someone’s life and thought, “I wonder how they ended up there?” Maybe it’s a woman standing in an intersection, maybe a man panhandling, or that same child dropped off at school every day, disheveled and hungry. But what if your knee-jerk reaction is wrong? What if those people we so quickly judge are more like us than we think? This is the Not That Different podcast, where we look at the stories behind the statistics, the real people behind the word homelessness.
Because when we stop and listen, we start to understand something surprising. Individuals experiencing homelessness aren’t those people. They’re mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers. They’re our neighbors, the people God calls us to love. Today we’re talking with Linda Uveges, the CEO of The City Mission, my boss, who oversees both Laura’s Home Women’s Crisis Center and Crossroads Men’s Crisis Center. Linda’s journey with The City Mission began as a volunteer over 20 years ago and has grown into a leadership role shaped by deep commitment, lived experience with the organization, and a passion for serving people experiencing homelessness.
In this conversation, she will share her perspective on the mission, the programs we offer, and why this work continues to matter so deeply in our community. And through conversations like this one and the many episodes that we have planned, one truth will continue to come to light. We’re really Not That Different. I’m Jaime Buxton. I’m the senior manager of community engagement at The City Mission in Cleveland, Ohio, and it’s my passion to be able to share these stories with you, to unpack what homelessness really looks like, and to destigmatize the word homelessness and the people who are experiencing it.
Let’s jump right in. I’m so excited to be able to be here with Linda. Linda and I started at The City Mission around the same time, 21 years ago, and it’s my joy to not just work for her, but to work with her, to be mentored by her, and I’m really excited to kind of pick through some questions I haven’t talked to you about either ever or in a really long time.
Linda Uveges: I know, I’m looking forward to it, too, Jaime. Thank you so much for having me.
Jaime Buxton: I mean, it’s my joy. All right, Linda, can you take us back to the beginning? How did you first get connected with The City Mission as a volunteer?
Discovering Laura’s Home
Linda Uveges: Sure. I remember a friend of mine who told me about this new place on the west side of Cleveland that’s opening its doors, and I thought, “You know, that would be really a great opportunity for me and our five kids.” So, I was at home, stay-at-home mom with five children, and homeschooling them at the time, and I thought, “This would be something really good for us to get out of our little bubble and experience something outside.” And so, I went for a tour at the mission, at Laura’s Home, and I absolutely fell in love with it.
When I thought of a shelter, I’m thinking it’s going to be a little bit dark and kind of dirty, with dorm rooms everywhere, but when I went there, it was beautiful, and it was full of hope. It was light. Women had their own rooms who were single, and most of the families had their own room as well, and I just fell in love with it, and I imagined this facility being full.
Yeah. And so, we jumped in and became volunteers, and my husband and I and our five kids, we started by leading chapel, and then also providing meals. At that time, there were only a few families, you know, residing there, and loved serving as a volunteer, getting to know the women. I think what impressed me the most was I was also looking for something meaningful and that aligned with our faith, and it was clear that the mission aligned so well, and then the other thing that really drew me was the women.
And being able to have conversation with them, where all pretenses are down. You know, when you go to church, and it’s wonderful. I love my church, but if you say, “Hi, how are you doing?” everybody’s doing just fine. Right. Right? And here, when we served at Laura’s Home, women would just tell you the truth. Mhm. And that they’re struggling, and that they’re hurting, and this is difficult. And I loved having meaningful, purposeful conversation.
Saying yes to new opportunities
Jaime Buxton: Mhm. So, imagine we’re in that same space, you’ve got young kids, you’re starting part-time. Could you ever have imagined that you’d become the CEO?
Linda Uveges: Never. Never in a million years, honestly. It’s not something that I set out to achieve or to climb any ladder. Mhm. Really, my heart was to serve wherever God wants to use me. Mhm. I remember working security, of course, was really fun, and I loved being on the front line. I loved caring for individuals who would come through the doors for the first time, feeling very discouraged, afraid, angry, all kinds of emotions, and being able to greet them at the door with the love of Christ.
To me, it just doesn’t get much better than that, to show that and to do it in a very practical way. And so, no, I never imagined, and then when I was offered to be the manager of Laura’s Home, I was like, “Oh my goodness, I have arrived.” I really felt like this is a dream come true, and it really was. It really, really was, and so grateful for that.
Growing into leadership
Jaime Buxton: What was the time frame? Sorry to cut you off, but I know the history, so I don’t want to glaze over things. How long from when you were part-time security till the program manager?
Linda Uveges: Yes, that’s a great question. Because I also worked a year in the kitchen, so I was part-time security, then full-time, then security supervisor, then in the kitchen for a year. So, I want to say about four or five years before being offered, you know, that really was an assistant manager Right. While the manager was retiring, and so I sat with her for almost a year and learned from her, and she certainly was my mentor, you know, Pam Glicker.
I have so much respect for her and how she mentored me as well. And I would say, you know, I really felt like this is just such a great opportunity, even though I felt like I don’t know if I can do it, I wanted to say yes to what God is calling me to do, and so I went for it and just knew that I had an incredible staff to support me and an incredible family to support me as well.
Jaime Buxton: And then you kept saying yes after that. So, you become program manager, you go back to school.
Linda Uveges: Yes, which was really interesting because it had been over 25 years since I’d been to school. I graduated high school, and I was offered this position, and the CEO at the time did not know I didn’t have a degree. Mhm. And so, to be asked to go back to school was really overwhelming to me, and I instantly felt inadequate and scared, and I don’t think I’m smart enough. I don’t think I can do this.
But I again I had great encouragement to do it, and my kids and my husband, and so I took advantage of the opportunity, and again willing to say yes, and got my degree. I loved it so much, and so then I asked the CEO at the time, “Would it be okay if I went and got my master’s degree? What do you think about that?” He goes, “Great.” I had served about four years as the program manager, and he said, “I’d like you to be the chief operating officer.” And again, those feelings of inadequacy, and maybe you’ve heard of the imposter syndrome, where I thought sometimes, “Well, are you sure you’re making the right decision?
Do you really know?” Because I’m not all that, and I have a lot of flaws and weaknesses, and so I was very I was really struggling with being okay with that. And then I loved it because my husband, Tom, says, “You know, you’ve been a COO for years at home. That’s what a mom does. You’re in charge of operations.” I’m like, “Oh, yeah.” That really helped me, actually.
Jaime Buxton: Yeah.
The needs behind homelessness
Linda Uveges: And so, I said, “Sure.” So, I served as the COO for six years, and loved that and loved being part of operations and learning.
Jaime Buxton: So, you’ve been here for 20 plus years. How have you seen the needs change for the people that come to us?
Linda Uveges: Mhm. I know it might not be the answer you’re expecting, but I don’t know that they’ve changed that much. You know, when we talk about poverty, we talk about broken relationships. And really, that’s what we’ve seen as a common theme throughout all of these years. Many of our residents come to us who have lost all relationships, maybe due to addiction or mental illness or trauma. It could be anything. And I realized that, you know, we often say, “Poverty is not just I don’t have enough money.” But it’s it’s poverty of relationships.
And so, that’s been broken. And so, we see that commonly among our men and our women. And so, in that sense, I think it’s very similar. But obviously, the way that people respond to it or deal with it is different, right? It might be medicating. It might be numbing. It might be isolating. So, there’s so many ways that people respond to it, and it’s all different. And I think that’s real important to know that at the core, we all long to be loved and accepted.
And for whatever reason, life has happened to them, or they’ve been a victim, or they also have done some things that have consequences that have impacted how they live. So, I guess I would go back to just that basic need and desire that we all have.
Jaime Buxton: Mhm. And I think that’s the perfect answer, yes. And I totally agree. You know, The City Mission is different in that we offer long-term holistic programming, right? And so, when you talk about kind of I’ll call them the symptoms of those lack of relationships or healthy relationships, why is it so important that we have that long-term care?
Linda Uveges: Right. I don’t know about you, but when I have an issue in my life, it doesn’t just take me 30 days to figure it out. It takes me a while and to learn to learn a new behavior, to learn a new discipline in my life. It doesn’t just change overnight. And so, we know there are studies that show this that the best way to address what’s happening inside someone’s heart is to really get to the root causes.
And like you said, those symptoms, those are really just what we see on the surface, but there’s so much more. And not until someone comes to the mission, do they ever get that opportunity to really kind of unpeel and peel back those layers. And what’s great, they’re peeling them back in a safe environment.
Jaime Buxton: Right.
The time and trust needed for healing
Linda Uveges: You’ve got supportive caseworkers and staff and even your individuals that are in the program with you Right. Doing this together, and you’re not alone. And so, I just I love that we have the freedom to do that. And as you know, we don’t receive any government funding. And not that, you know, that’s all a negative thing, but for us, it gives us freedom to have a program where we can extend the length of time and be able to really look at what brought an individual here.
And I think that brings dignity. Mhm. We’re not saying, “What’s wrong with you?” Right. We’re talking about what’s happened to you. Right. And that’s our trauma-informed care approach. So, being able to do that, it takes time. And many people, and even myself, growing up, maybe I thought a certain thing was normal in my family, how I was raised. And then you have your own family, and you’re like, “Oh, no. I think I don’t I don’t want to do that.
I want to do something different.” And so, when women and men come here, they thought that, “Oh, this is just normal and how a family or how I was treated was okay.” And once they get here and see and see something different, Mhm. The light goes on, and they see, “Oh, that wasn’t okay. And now I’m in a safe place to really unpack that and deal with whatever that was maybe in their past, and they can heal from their past experiences.”
Jaime Buxton: Yeah. What do you wish more people that hear about us or see what we’re doing or even see those people on a street corner, what do you wish they knew about what it takes to move from crisis to stability?
Linda Uveges: Yes. Good question. Before I came to the mission, I’ll be very honest. I felt people pick yourself up by your bootstraps, right? What are you doing? You can work. Honestly, I had all those kind of assumptions about individuals. And not until I came here did I learn what individuals go through. And many of our residents are victims of trauma and mental illness And one thing that I’ve learned, too, is well, I remember at the front desk at Laura’s Home, and a mom came in, and she was really not very nice.
And I am very naive and new to my role and as a security guard. I was like, “Welcome to Laura’s Home. I’m so glad you’re here.” And she looked at me like, “Who are you? You know nothing about me. You don’t know my life. You don’t know what I’ve been through. And you don’t look anything like me.” And she literally said, “You’re going to go home to your nice little family and your nice little house and your nice little neighborhood.” And certainly, she made assumptions about me as well, not knowing me, but she wasn’t wrong.
And I realized she wasn’t angry at me. She was scared. Mhm. And once you build that trust, it changed everything. And you could see her soften over time. So, I say that to say individuals never start, you know, “Someday I want to go to The City Mission.” No. It’s hard. It isn’t what they planned. This isn’t their dream come true. Right. So, they are they are scared. There’s fear of trust. And especially with moms, they are afraid like, “Will my children be safe?
Will my belongings be safe? How will I do this? And are you going to are you going to hurt me like everybody else has? Are you going to abandon me like everybody else has?” So, those are the realities of those that we serve, those individuals we serve. And you know, I mentioned just pick yourself up by your bootstraps. And I love that I heard a quote from actually one of the Supreme Court justices saying, “What if they don’t have any bootstraps?” You know, we have resources, you know, more than maybe somebody else does.
And those who have experienced generational poverty, they don’t. And they don’t know how. So, we need to come alongside, especially as believers in the church and Christian organizations, we need to help and talk about what does that look like, and how can we help you achieve your goals. So, I guess there’s always more behind the person that you don’t know. And don’t make assumptions. Don’t just think they’re lazy, or they don’t want to work.
That’s not been my experience here with people we’ve served. Sometimes, Yeah. Somebody that’s just going to take advantage of the system.
Jaime Buxton: But we still get to serve them, right and show them something different. And in my opinion, some of those end up to be some of our greatest testimonies at the end because they came saying, “I’m not going to participate in this, and this isn’t going to be good for me, or I’m not really interested.” And usually, that’s when God does his greatest work.
Linda Uveges: Yes. Absolutely.
What success looks like
Jaime Buxton: So, we’ve established that the start is difficult, and people come hopeless, right? So, what does success look like for the individuals as they complete and get ready to leave the mission?
Linda Uveges: That’s great. You’re asking me some tough questions. That’s good. I love it. Success, you know, what does success look like? First and foremost, it’s sharing the gospel. And it’s hopefully reconnecting them to their faith. Many of our residents have grown up in a home where going to church was every Sunday. A grandmother that did that and prayed for them. And so first of all, we want to make sure the gospel is a priority.
So we hope and that’s you know, that’s why we have two chaplains on staff and that’s why every single person on our staff has a relationship with Jesus. And so that we can care for them in that way. And so success is you know, seeing that transformation of the heart. And success isn’t always you got a home or you got an apartment or you got a job. Those are good things. But the success is the transformation.
And as our core value says, you know, we believe that God transforms lives. It’s he that does the work. We are just here to be servants to help others understand and to present the gospel in a very clear and compassionate way. So I think success is going to look different for each person. Some will be reunited with family. For some, maybe it’s better that they don’t and that they have established a different support system.
My hope is that when an individual leaves here that they are clearly aware of the gospel and that has resonated in their heart. And then also that they have a new support system and way to thrive in life. You know, we want thriving not just surviving. And that’s sometimes hard to measure.
Leading while staying connected
Jaime Buxton: How do you balance being the visionary leader of The City Mission but also having to deal with practical programming of the day-to-days?
Linda Uveges: Yes, that has been a big challenge for me to be honest. And because I came from operations, I came from manager of Laura’s Home and I love it. So one thing that I realized as I continued to progress in the mission, I moved further and further away from the residents. And that made me really sad. And so I have made sure that I’ve taken steps to be connected to our residents. And I want to make sure that I like I was at Laura’s Home today and I talked to the ladies and just sit with them at lunchtime or ask about their stories or the men in our warehouse who are residents and how are you doing?
What brought you here? What phase are you in? How’s it going? What’s your favorite class? So those are ways that I like to stay connected to our residents. And as far as the shift, I remember specifically when I became the COO and it was at one of our staff picnics. And I realized that God has moved me like no, Linda, you’re no longer the manager of Laura’s Home overseeing the residents there in the program.
But I’ve given you a different group to care for and that was the staff. As a COO, I felt like it was the staff that God has brought me to care for. And so I think a lot about that to make sure I try to stay in my lane and be that visionary. And you can ask anybody on my team, they’ll let you know, Linda, maybe that’s not, you know, do you need to be doing this?
And one thing I learned over the last few years is that God has given me unique gifts and I used to kind of downplay those or think I’m not enough. But instead I’ve embraced them and like, oh, this is how you created me. This is the gift that you gave me. So I’m going to embrace those and walk in them in faith. Not because I’m anything special, but because God has given you unique gifts and me unique gifts and each one of our staff.
And so I want to I want to walk in that and not shy away from it. Sometimes there’s a balance of that, you know, so and I love to problem solve. I love when there’s a problem, all right, I got it. But there’s an amazing staff on my leadership team and you and managers, they can do the same. And I’m available as they need me.
Finding hope in difficult work
Jaime Buxton: So the work can be hard and overwhelming and just like you’ve shared, you’re still connected to residents and hearing their stories. What keeps you hopeful, Linda?
Linda Uveges: Mhm. Well, it has to be the gospel. It really is because God changed my life and he I know he can change others. And that is my only hope for transformation. And one of my favorite verses is in Romans 5:8, but God demonstrates his love toward us and while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. That’s our hope. Our hope is only in Jesus. And we can’t fix every problem. We won’t and I don’t think God calls us to do that.
But I can go home at night feeling good knowing that we’ve offered hope to every person here. And especially when I was the manager at Laura’s Home, it felt pretty discouraging at times and I know our case workers feel that. This is so discouraging. You have a client or resident who has made great progress and then they relapse. And you kind of question, well, did anything we taught them make a difference?
And it does. We are planting. We are planting seeds. We are giving the hope that we know and it’s up to God to transform their lives. So I my hope is in him. Not me. And not any one of our staff to be honest to make that change, but it will be in him and it will be in his timing. And it might take a resident two, three times. We know that not everybody gets it the first time.
Again, I don’t get it the first time.
Jaime Buxton: Right. Thank you so much. I think we have a common passion for being advocates for The City Mission and for the men, the women and the children and really having the joy of getting to be in the community and sharing that with others. What would you like our listeners who feel disconnected from poverty or homelessness, what do you want them to understand better from hearing you today?
Linda Uveges: Right. Well, like I said, I didn’t know. So I spent a lot of time listening and observing and being curious. I think the curiosity of what individuals are going through instead of making assumptions or judgments or bias, any of those, you know, learn and, honestly, get involved. It doesn’t have to be at The City Mission. It could be in any place that you feel passionate about to serve. Whether it’s those who are hungry or those who are in prison.
Get involved and learn. So I guess realizing that every single person has dignity, that changes everything for me. Mhm. I don’t have feelings of judgment or criticism when I remember that everyone is made in the image of God. So if you start there, I guarantee that there’s a place for you to serve, to volunteer and to understand who we serve again or any other organization that you feel passionate about. So learn and be educated on that.
Getting involved
Jaime Buxton: I love that. Thank you.
Linda Uveges: You’re welcome.
Jaime Buxton: Thank you so much for being a guest on our podcast. I mean, it really is your podcast. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to do this and to be able to be a mouthpiece for the Mission. And more than that, for men, women, and children experiencing homelessness.
Linda Uveges: Yes. Thank you, Jaime.
Jaime Buxton: Thanks for joining us on Not That Different. We hope that this episode cleared your mind, helped you understand more about the people that we serve here, and in general, kind of destigmatized what homelessness is to you and how close it really can be to you personally. If you got excited or your heart started to beat fast as you heard Linda talk about volunteering or getting involved, we’d love for you to join us here at The City Mission in Cleveland.
Check out our website at thecitymission.org. And if you’re not close to here, please find a mission, find somewhere where you can get involved helping others. Don’t forget to like and subscribe, and we will look forward to seeing you again soon.