I’m quite aware these days are not the best of days for newspapers. Yet it was me who asked one of my colleagues at Resources for Human Development to oversee the launch of a newspaper to be produced largely by the men and women in our nonprofit’s shelters.

You can now have that newspaper, One Step Away, in your hands. The residents of our homeless shelters, the Ridge Center and the Woodstock Family Shelter, have produced the first street newspaper in Philadelphia's history.

Although I had toyed with the idea years ago, the notion resurfaced when I was in Washington, D.C., earlier this fall, and I ran into a homeless vendor for that city’s Street Sense publication.

Homelessness and affordable housing have always been important issues to me and my organization. I reasoned if a “street paper” can give residents of our shelters a chance to productively earn money from the sale of it, while also elevating the plight of homelessness and affordable housing on the city’s social radar, we should be publishing one in Philadelphia.

While newspapers in general may not be doing so great, I think One Step Away will do just fine, mainly because it is a different kind of newspaper with a perspective that can’t be found anywhere else.

One Step Away is more relevant now than it would have been when I first thought of pursuing it. In this economy, many wage-earners are one step away from being where those in homeless shelters are. A few missed paychecks, a foreclosure, a divorce, an unexpected medical bill ... all of us are ultra-vulnerable to the curse of homelessness.

But homelessness is not a terminal condition. Many of those in our shelters are one step away from leaving it behind. All they need is a break: landing a job, learning a skill, finding an affordable place to live.

Those of us with solid roofs over our heads can help those in shelters take that final step to leave homelessness behind. 

We can buy this newspaper to help put dollars in their pockets. We can act on the issues described in these pages. We can get involved in the movement to end homelessness in Philadelphia — for good.

Step up and support One Step Away and join us in this historic effort.