CHOA Events

CHOA has in-person gatherings every 6 months.  These are just 2 hours on a Saturday morning, from 9:15am to 11:30am.  Gratefully, about 20-30 folks show up.  Our past events are shown below.  These gatherings allows CHOA to share with the faith community what CHOA is doing on housing, what is going on with housing in Arcadia, and what is coming up.  These are also really helpful times to just connect with real people, and be encouraged by what others are doing.  Sometimes that helps us all see and be encouraged that, yes, we can make an impact…together..as we each do our part.  We like to go to a different church for each event.  If your church would like to host our next gathering, please contact CHOA.

CHOA also has other events from time to time, like our new CHOA Academy in March of 2025, as well as a few prayer gatherings for housing in Septembers in 2023 and 2024.

Upcoming Events

CHOA’s next upcoming Sharing Gathering will be on Saturday morning of April 18th (after Easter).  We are still determining the location.  Watch here for more details in the next month or so.

Past Events

Below are the events CHOA has held since starting in the Spring of 2022.  We have an in-person Sharing Gathering every 6 months on Saturday mornings, to share updates and invite the faith community to be engaged; usually around 30 people come to these gatherings.  Take a look what we did by clicking the dates links below (dates in green).  We provide our handouts, slides, and videos for each event in the bellow links.  Contact us to get the password for these web pages (to see the videos).

  • Nov. 15th, 2025 – CHOA’s 7th Sharing Gathering was at the Church of the Good Shepherd.  Again, Mayor Kwan and Mayor Pro Tem Wang attended, as well as former Mayor, April Verlato.  It was a Saturday of heavy rain, but still a total of 17 folks made it.  Also speaking was Jake Pierce from Abundant Housing LA, on SB 79, on housing near transit areas.
  • May 10th, 2025 – CHOA had our 6th Sharing Gathering, again at the Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration.  Both Mayor Kwan and Mayor Pro Tem Wang attended.  We had a special guest in Matthew Brennan form L.A. CADA share how the connect and server the unhouse in Arcadia.
  • March 29, 2025 – CHOA had a new event, called the CHOA Academy.  This event was created to empower others to be housing advocates in Arcadia.  We reviewed Scripture on Moses and Exodus Chapter 3, and see how that applies to us.  We also toured around Arcadia, visiting the many key locations where housing is changing in Arcadia.  We are grateful that Santa Anita Church hosted us.  We also met with Mayor Pro. Tem Sharon Kwan at the City Council chambers.
  • Oct. 19th, 2024 – Our 5th Sharing Gathering was at Arcadia Community Church.  In the first half of our time, we focused on the Inclusionary Ordinance, thanked City Councilmember April Verlato for her extraordinary service for 8 years, and especially on housing.  In the 2nd half, we heard updates from Hill Church on their food distribution, some flash updates on Safe Parking in Arcadia on not being able to go forward, and had a “field trip” to the nearby Lucile parcel, that is deemed for affordable housing.
  • Sept 14th, 2024 – Praying for Housing – Again, Hope International Church hosted our prayer time, for a 2nd year.  Click here for the list of our praises and prayer list.  We need to keep praying!!
  • April 20th, 2024 – This Sharing Session was thankfully at Hills Church again.  Our main focus was a new effort, Safe Parking Program.  We had Foothill Unity Center share, as well as hear from Pastor Sharon from Trinity Lutheran church in Pasadena.  They have held their Safe Parking Program for 2 years in Pasadena.  We also heard again from Mayor April Verlato, on the Homelessness Symposium in February, and little bit about affordable housing on the Lucile parcel.  CHOA shared on the Housing Element, on the Rezoning vote passed in February, and the upcoming Inclusionary Ordinance vote coming before City Countil in the next few months.
  • Nov. 4th, 2023 – CHOA’s 3rd Sharing Session was at Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration.  Mayor April Verlato spoke about affordable housing being built by the San Gabriel Valley Regional Trust.  CHOA shared on the Housing Element, Affordable Housing, and briefly introduced the Safe Parking Program idea for Arcadia.
  • Sept. 15th, 2023 – Pray for Housing – We were led (and hosted) by Hope International Church in prayer for housing in Arcadia.  This is our prayer list for the next 12 months. Please continue to pray for housing until the next election in Nov. 2024.
  • April 29th, 2023 – This Sharing session was at the Hills Church, on what CHOA is doing, and what you can do to reduce homelessness, and build affordaable housing.
  • Nov. 5th 2022 – Our first Sharing Session was gathering to hear about Short-term efforts, the Housing Count, the Hills Church food distribtuion, and from Abundant LA.  We met at Santa Anita Church.
  • April 30, 2022 – Exploring Arcadia Housing Solutions…our first gathering, led by Jill Shook, with Making Housing and Community Happen, in Pasadena.  This gathering was our initial effort, and then we created a team, calling ourselves CHOA (Creative Housing Options in Arcadia.)  We are grateful to Foothill Unity Center for hosting us.