HENRICO COUNTY, Va. — In the eight years Dan Kearns has worked with St. Vincent de Paul Richmond, he says the Catholic nonprofit is now serving more people who are part of the "hidden homeless."
"A lot of people are just on the edge," Kearns said. "They may not be defined as homeless by federal standards, but they are absolutely not in a sustainable housing situation."
Kearns said oftentimes, families who are considered part of the "hidden homeless" are living in motels but cannot afford to make a deposit on an apartment or home.
"In Henrico County, we were actually surprised to find out last year, there were over 1,300 students in Henrico schools that were considered homeless, and we found out that there is about 113 of those children, those students, that are living in this motel situation," Kearns said.
This fall, St. Vincent de Paul Richmond is launching its Motel 2 Home program, which helps provide financial assistance with deposits and other move-in costs.
"They don't have money to pay a deposit, they may have a challenging credit score," Kearns said.
Kearns said while the program has proven successful in Atlanta, it won't be an easy task.
"The challenge is honestly finding enough landlords that are willing to say, 'Yes, we want to do this.' Certainly, reputable landlords," Kearns said. "I think that this is one of the barriers of the program that we're going to look to overcome, is how can we work with, whether it is a local landlord, or a larger, even a national-type landlord, to say, 'Hey, we want to step in and help?'"
As part of the program, trained volunteers will be tasked with meeting with participants month by month to offer case management support, budget counseling, and job help.
"It could just be listening to them," Kearns said. "Because so many people in poverty don't have somebody there to listen to them."
Kearns said St. Vincent de Paul Richmond has been providing meals, furniture and utility support for the last eight years, in which they've worked with an estimated 3,000 people.
"This is certainly a small subset of that, but we know again, the numbers, just in Henrico alone, it being over 100, we could see that number grow," Kearns said.
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