Who We Are

Our Mission

Transforming the American mental health system through Radical Hospitality.  

We promote bold system change and advance Radical Hospitality along with the guiding principles that characterize the global best practice based in Trieste, Italy including:

RIGHT TO
A PURPOSEFUL LIFE

SOCIAL
RECOVERY

SYSTEM
ACCOUNTABILITY

WHOLE PERSON
CARE

  • We are disruptors who are dissatisfied with the status quo.

  • We are change-makers who understand that systematic transformation is an ongoing process.

  • We model a relational, collaborative approach to coming alongside people. 

  • We lead with curiosity and Radical Hospitality.

What Is Radical Hospitality?

Radical Hospitality is informed by the Italian word accoglienza, a concept ubiquitous in the community mental health centers of Trieste. It connotes a posture of horizontality, requiring that we come alongside people as human beings, subverting the expectation that status, education, class or privilege creates a worthiness that elevates one human being over another.

We define Radical Hospitality, therefore, as a posture to assume relative to another human being: 

  • I see you 

  • I hear you 

  • You are safe here 

  • Your voice matters

Practicing Radical Hospitality

Supported by our donors and volunteers, we practice Radical Hospitality through:

Programming in permanent supportive housing communities, board & cares, our local clubhouse and the county jail. We engage our staff and volunteers to build consistent community with residents through purposeful activities that activate new interests, goal setting, and empowerment.

Innovating through collaboration, curiosity, and nimbleness. We work with our partners to pilot programs that embrace our guiding principles, substantiate our findings through research, and bring disruption to the brokenness of the American mental health system.

Our Logo

When a delegation from Trieste came to view LA’s system in 2018 and sat down with our county supervisor for Hollywood, Dr. Roberto Mezzina said, "You may think you closed the asylum in the United States, but what we witnessed here today was an open air asylum." We had just come from a tour of Skid Row.

The symbol of the horse – cavallo in Italian – symbolizes freedom from the asylum.  

Marco Cavallo was a horse that pulled the laundry cart at the San Giovanni mental asylum in Trieste. In 1959, he was scheduled to be “retired” and replaced with a truck. However the residents prevailed upon the authorities to spare his life, thus allowing him to live out his retirement on the grounds of the asylum.