Staff Spotlight: Lovella Calica

6/7/2022

Bastion Social Worker Lovella Calica

In some ways, you could say Bastion’s social worker, Lovella Calica, had been preparing to work with our veterans and residents for more than a decade before landing at Bastion.

Calica arrived in New Orleans in the Summer of 2020 to oversee Bastion’s virtual wellness center, but she had begun working with veterans in 2004. In 2008, she founded Warrior Writers, a national writing program specifically for vets and their families.

“It’s about using art to facilitate healing, documentation, community building and expression,” Calica, who is also a writer, photographer and multimedia artist, says.

Healing and community building are two of the cornerstones of the Bastion mission, and Calica fit in immediately with the residents and staff. Before coming to Bastion, she enrolled in a master’s program in social work, which she completed in 2021, becoming Bastion’s onsite social worker. She says that her job entails a wide range of responsibilities, and is, as she puts, “different everyday, which I love.”

That makes sense considering that healing and community building can take many forms. On any given day, Calica could be doing a variety of meaningful actions including:

Helping a blind veteran pay his bills online and access additional healthcare services
Organize a weekly run/walk to City Park
Supporting the Bastion Emergency Response Team, which is getting residents more prepared for this year’s storm season
Holding regular sessions on TRE (Tension and Trauma Releasing Exercises), doing EMDR, meditation and community circles.

Calica says that part of her role is just checking in on people and for her, that can be as simple as, “knocking on doors and seeing how people are doing.” She is also readily available for one-on-one counseling sessions for residents.

For Calica, all of the efforts represent what Bastion is all about, using community as an intervention tool and the value of connectivity. She says that Bastion residents are open to trying something new, and their conversations show Calica that as community member and staffer, her endeavors are valued and appreciated.

“In this work, changes aren’t always visible, but to hear about their changes and improvements is very valuable and rewarding to me,” Calica says.

Staff Spotlight: Lovella Calica

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