About

Our Mission:

To provide jobs and work opportunities for Street Survivors (current and formerly unhoused individuals).

To pay enough so that Street Survivors can afford housing.

What We’ve Done Already: Whoohoo!

With our Prevail Mix products, in two months we have accomplished what we thought would take a year:

One wonderful person out of transitional housing and into an apartment

One unhoused person to take his spot at transitional housing

We’ve already gotten one person out of the homeless cycle, and another off the street!

What’s Next? Prevail Together

Prevail Together is a theme-based variety show due to begin in Spring, 2022. This show will feature local talent, address myths and pop culture, and be a marketing arm for Prevail Mix (via funny commercials). We expect to address issues concerning homelessness on each show. It will be fun, exciting, awesome, beyond compare!

More Info About Us

Prevail News is a 510(c)(3) non-profit corporation. We Do Business As (DBA) Prevail Mix. We are based in Saint Paul, MN, operating virtually (without an office space) to limit our expenses. At this time, we have no paid administrators with all monies made going directly to those who work for Prevail Mix (currently one person).

Contact info:

Jerry Sedgewick, Director
jerry(at)prevailnews(dot)org or admin@prevailnews.org
651-788-2261 (Jerry’s cell phone: please text)

Food Distributor License

Board of Directors:

Sabrina Garbutt (Business Consulting), Ed Fisher (Retired Lawyer), Daniel Velner (former IT specialist and Street Survivor), Arthur Johnson (Homeless Center Volunteer) and Treasurer, Margaret Solberg (Real Estate Sales) and John Marboe (Pastor, Zion Lutheran Church).

History:

Prevail News was formed in 2015 to produce newspapers for vendors to sell alongside roads. It was our hope that Prevail News could replicate what has been done in Nashville, Tennessee, where all who are homeless and formerly homeless sell newspapers instead of holding signs. However, in the Twin Cities, it is more profitable to panhandle than it is to sell newspapers. Furthermore, those who panhandle are not always homeless.

Our focus shifted to producing a documentary entitled “Guttered.” The documentary was made to give viewers a first-hand view of homelessness via the filmmaker (Jerry Sedgewick). Jerry uses a hidden camera to record his experiences sleeping overnight in a shelter, eating at a soup kitchen, interviewing to find social services and a place to live, and going through steps to find a job. Stories from five former street survivors comment on what it was like to be homeless throughout the documentary.

Final reflections on the outcome for chronically homeless persons come in a eureka moment when behavior epi-genetic effects enter the picture. The film points out that trauma can create permanent behavioral changes through the DNA (epi-genetics), thus pushing for the urgent need to get street people into housing immediately.

Prevail News now continues its original mission to provide jobs. Our first business is Prevail Mix, operated at Zion Lutheran Church in Saint Paul through the generosity of their pastor, John Marboe and staff, most notably Sue Widerski. Our first pancake/waffle mixes, corn muffin mix and batter mix are sold at Hampden Coop in Saint Paul.

Donations:

Your donation goes directly toward automating our operation so that we can hire more Street Survivors and scale up.