Homeless prevention program paying big benefits for shelter

For many, the idea of a homeless shelter is a place to go when you’re out on the streets. But one shelter in Cedar Rapids is putting a greater emphasis on preventing homelessness in the first place.

In 2016, the Willis Dady shelter in Cedar Rapids housed 480 different people overnight. But a shelter prevention program helped keep 722 people in their own homes before they got evicted or lost housing.

And shelter director Phoebe Trepp says when it comes to stretching dollars, prevention definitely pays off.

She said it costs Willis Dady $28.00 a day for every person who needs a shelter bed. But the amount spent on each family member for prevention services, $18.00 one time, is a much better bargain.

The Willis Dady prevention program celebrated a 5th anniversary this week. Trepp says during those years at least 2,000 people have stayed in homes with early intervention assistance.

“Last year, it was over 700 people served and only two percent later ended up in a shelter. That’s a huge gain on not seeing people come in who would have occupied a shelter bed,” she said.

Trepp says the trick is to find those people two to four weeks away from losing a home and work with them, and landlords, to find other options.

Rachelle Brown knows what it’s like to lose a home for financial reasons.

It happened four or five years ago when she had just one child and wound up sleeping in a car for a time.

Last month, she faced a similar crisis. She’d just given birth and her fiancé was in treatment and not working and she couldn’t scrape up enough money to cover the month’s rent on her home.

“It was really stressful, three kids and didn’t want to put them in the predicament of having to move again and not knowing where we were going to go,” Brown said.

But instead of just waiting for the eviction notice, Brown found out about the homeless prevention program run by the Willis Dady shelter.

She contacted the outreach counselor who helped locate help from other agencies.

Emily Zimmon, the homeless prevention counselor, says if the program can find someone two to four weeks before housing is lost, often they can prevent the situation from happening.

“Sometimes it’s finding a landlord with an apartment in their price range, other times it’s finding different organizations that are already providing assistance,” she said.

In Brown’s case, a few hundred dollars in direct help, and encouraging her to get a roommate to share expenses, was enough to avoid the crisis.

Willis Dady leaders say in the most recent year with statistics, more than 95 percent of people who asked for homeless prevention help were able to stay out of the shelters.