Downtown’s Skid Row is making big strides in helping the homeless survive on the streets thanks to one philanthropist—all 4-foot-11-inches of him.
Jonas Corona, 10, attends elementary school full time at The New City School in Long Beach and loves to play tennis. Jonas also founded his own charity and travels across Los Angeles speaking to children about how to make a difference in their community.
“I love helping kids and showing them they can do things to help people,” says Jonas.
Jonas’ mother, Renee Corona, took her whole family to volunteer serving food and drinks to the homeless when Jonas was only four-years-old. After that first day, Jonas said he wanted to come back to help every month.
Jonas volunteered for two years pouring hot cocoa in the winter and fruit punch in summer for hundreds of homeless Angelenos looking for a hot meal.
“I’m not a morning person,” says Renee through laughs. “He’d get up out of bed and be like ‘mom, it’s time—we gotta go,’ and I’d be like can’t we just miss?”
Renee says Jonas is always ready to wake up for the Saturday morning event, eager to help out however he can. While serving food on one such morning, Jonas saw something he’d never thought about before.
“When I was six-years-old, I saw a homeless kid. I didn’t know there were homeless kids,” says Jonas.
Renee says Jonas could not fathom that someone his age was living on the streets. Jonas told his mother he wanted to do more than just serve food once a month.
“He wrote a letter to us and told us why he liked going down to Skid Row, how it made him feel, why he wanted to help people and that he was just going to do it,” remembers Renee.
The nonprofit organization Love in the Mirror was born soon after.
Jonas, along with his family and friends, began collecting donations for every item they felt would be useful to the homeless population in Los Angeles.
They first started with food and clothes. As time went along, they began to hone in on the things they felt were most critical for living on the streets.
“In the winter, they need socks to keep them warm.” says Jonas. “Especially in the rain.”
He also started to call for donations for toiletries and feminine hygiene products. Asking for these things alone brought attention to the basic necessities homeless people go without.
Jonas knew he wanted to help kids in more than one way. His mission is to empower them to chase their dreams and create change. However, before he could share his message, he had to work on saying it aloud.
“He was humble, to the point where we would encourage him to practice his speaking skills and to share,” says Maggie Solorzano-Muneton, Jonas’ kindergarten teacher.
According to Solorzano-Muneton, Jonas embraced public speaking only when he realized it would help reach more kids.
Jonas overcame the hurdles of speaking in public and sharing what’s most important to him in front of his peers. He encourages that same bravery when he speaks to classrooms throughout Los Angeles.
As a part of his mission, Jonas also mentors pre-schoolers Solorzano-Muneton teaches now. He helps them with math and bilingual reading and writing. Jonas has also inspired them to start collecting donations for their own drives to help the communities they care about most.
“He helps us,” says Emma Jordan, one of Jonas’ mentees.”He can be the teacher too if he wants to.”
Jordan, like many others in her classroom jump up and shout when they see Jonas’ come through the door. Solorzano-Muneton says her students look forward to his visit every week.
Jonas says he loves to mentor kids and show them they can do anything, because he had to prove himself once as well. Although he wanted to volunteer for several charities throughout the city, they almost always had an age requirement Jonas could not meet.
Jonas tells kids how he didn’t just stop, and instead created Love in the Mirror with his family. This is especially why Jonas encourages children to “always try,” and not to let others keep them from doing the things they really want to do.
Jonas’ 5th grade teacher, Armando Munoz, makes a point in saying Jonas is still just a regular good kid.
“He likes to play around and be a little silly, but he can bring it back to getting things done,” says Munoz.
Jonas, a self described “math-lover,” says he wants to become a professional tennis player one day. He says he plans on using his earnings to continue helping people for no the rest of his life.
Jonas is currently working on a toiletry drive for the homeless next month and continues to mentor children in the L.A. area.