Bainbridge groups helping families on brink of homelessness

Published 4:03 pm Thursday, April 16, 2009

HRB and Helpline House are meeting a wave of demand in a sour economy.

Last month, a North Kitsap family of four was on the brink of homelessness.

Today they are tucked into a five-bedroom house on the north end of Bainbridge Island.

Their new landlord, a recent widow with space to spare, didn’t know the North Kitsap family until they were introduced by Joan Marsden, client services manager at Bainbridge Housing Resources Board.

Marsden said the parents in the North Kitsap family had both lost their jobs and were missing rent payments. After they received a three-day-pay-or eviction notice, they told their kids they were going on a vacation and moved into a motel for a week with the help of Fishline and St. Vincent dePaul Society. Then through HRB’s new HomeShare program, Marsden found the family rooms for rent in the Bainbridge house, where they pay a minimal rent and help with housework.

“They just moved in last weekend,” Marsden said. “It’s an ideal situation.”

Many more families stung by the recession still need help.

Over the last six months, HRB has been hit with a wave of requests for its rental-support services from North Kitsap and Bainbridge households. In January and February this year, 15 families requested rental assistance compared to just four over the same months last year. HRB’s staff believes the need will only increase through the spring.

Bainbridge’s Helpline House, which provides a food bank and wide range of social programs, has also been swamped with demand. Use of its nutritional programs is up nearly 50 percent over last year, according to Executive Director JoAnne Tews, and its counseling and financial assistance programs are also busy.

Both HRB and Helpline have found that many new clients are laid-off workers and professionals who don’t fit into the classic mold of low-income assistance seekers.

“It’s not the typical people anymore,” HRB Program and Development Director Kathy Cooper said. “It’s people losing jobs and losing homes.”

While most who come to HRB or Helpline simply need a hand paying bills and feeding mouths, there is an increasing number in search of shelter.

A 2009 survey conducted by the Kitsap Continuum of Care Coalition reported 17 adults and 17 children homeless on Bainbridge. Eight adults said they had gone homeless in 2008, five because they had lost their job or couldn’t find work.

But those numbers are deceivingly low, said Cooper, because only those seeking services from HRB and Helpline were included.

“The count does not include couch surfers, people on the street or in the woods,” Cooper said.

Staying at home

Until recently, HRB ran the island’s only transitional housing program, which helped move homeless people into rentals. But that program lost federal Housing and Urban Development funding and the board has begun renting its 10 transitional housing units as low-cost apartments.

Now HRB’s rental assistance work is focused on keeping people in their homes or finding them affordable options.

Most popular is its HomeFinder program, which serves people of all incomes and receives 500 calls a year, Cooper said. Its Emergency Rental Assistance provides bridge money to help residents in North Kitsap and Bainbridge stay in their homes or find new quarters. Cooper said HRB is careful to make sure the money is only bridge money and that the renter is in a home they can afford with a sustainable income.

In July, HRB added the HomeShare program, which matches people in search of cheap rent and homeowners with extra space. HRB seeks out residents with unused rooms or basements who are willing to rent them at below-market rates or in exchange for work on the property.

The renters get an inexpensive toehold to help them get back on their feet. The new landlord benefits from extra cash or help around the house. Some enter the program to help pay their own bills. So far HomeShare has made 10 matches, but Cooper said HRB hopes to find more prospective landlords to meet the growing need for cheap housing.

The HomeShare program is new, but the idea is not.

Terry Wagener has been hosting families in need at her island home since the late 1990s. One of the first families she rented to was a family of eight displaced from Kosovo.

Wagener admits she “bit off more than she could chew” with the refugee family, but since then she has rented the ground floor of her 4,000 square-foot house to a few tenants at a time.

Sharing her home can get frustrating, Wagener said, but she can’t ignore the need.

“It tears at your heart when you hear about some of the problems people go through,” she said. “I’d take everyone in if I could.”

Wagener works with HRB and Helpline to find people in need of inexpensive housing and rents the space at below-market rate. Some of her tenants stay for a month, some have stayed for years.

This year she is house-sharing with two women, and a man. One of the women, a young mother and Marine Corps veteran, was placed with Wagener after being referred to Helpline and HRB by a Veterans Affairs office. The woman said she and her 6-year-old are happy living with Wagener, and she plans to start classes at Olympic College this summer.

Wagener said she hopes other islanders see house sharing as a way of helping others while improving their own situation.

“This could be an opportunity for more people who own their homes but are having financial troubles,” Wagener said. “In this economy, it’s a time when we should all be helping each other if we can.”

Long lines at Helpline

On an island known for affluence, a growing number of residents are quietly confronting poverty.

Carpenters, real estate agents, even white-collar executives are seeking help, said Murray Prins, a social work supervisor for Helpine House.

“One thing every one of us here has heard people say is, ‘I have always given to Helpline. I never, never thought I would need its services,’” Prins said.

Demand has risen steadily at Helpline since last summer, exacerbated by the worsening economy and long, cold winter.

“Lots of folks are having to choose whether they are going to pay the car bill or they are going to put food on the table,” Tews said.

Along with utility assistance, Helpline also has a rental program. Historically it would only help renters with a steady income, and refer others to agencies such as the Department of Social and Health Services. But that has been a hard standard to maintain, with so many clients out of work, Prins said.

“We’re having to modify our protocols to accommodate these people,” he said.

Helpline staff members are finding that many of these first-time assistance seekers are hesitant to troop into their Knetchel Way offices. So to help ease that awkwardness, Helpline has begun holding more discreet counseling sessions a few days a week in the Elder and Adult Day Services building on Coppertop Loop.

“We’re hoping that people who would have trepidation about walking up our driveway will go there and meet with a social worker,” Prins said.

Prins said it’s important that people come in as soon as they need help, no matter which office it is.

“Don’t wait,” Prins said. “Come in when you get your first notice. Take action. It doesn’t get better. It only gets worse.”

Helping the helpers

For more information about HRB’s programs, log onto www.housingresourcesboard.org or call 842-1909.

Hyla Middle School students are staging a benefit for HRB’s rental assistance programs Sunday, April 19, at the Lynwood Theatre.