A city-parish initiative aimed at helping dozens of formerly homeless people secure housing wants to also help them find jobs.
The mayor’s office and a group of community partners last week moved 31 adults and five children who were living underneath the North Boulevard overpass into rental units around the parish. Ten more homeless adults will move into rental units next week, aided by the Homelessness to Housing Initiative.
Securing housing for the individuals is only part of the initiative, says Rowdy Gaudet, assistant chief administrative officer. To help keep them off the streets, the initiative has created an employment pipeline—through the nonprofit UpLIFTD—to give the formerly homeless adults jobs picking up litter and trash one day a week as well as help them develop essential job skills and get them back into the workforce.
UpLIFTD provides vocational services to the disabled and other individuals with barriers to employment. In February, the Metro Council approved spending $50,000 on a contract for UpLIFTD, which will use the money to pay the formerly homeless adults an hourly wage to assist the Department of Maintenance. Gaudet says the adults will eventually help with grass cutting.
Other U.S. cities—like Fort Worth, Texas; Denver; Chicago; and Albuquerque, New Mexico—have established similar programs, providing the homeless as much as $10 an hour, benefits and paid vacation to help keep city streets clean.
Nicole Walker, executive director of UpLIFTD, says the local initiative—which also pays $10 an hour—is still in its infancy, but she hopes it can be expanded next year. Currently, four of the formerly homeless adults—who are able to—are working. UpLIFTD provides their transportation, lunches and uniforms at no cost, she says.
Gaudet says the coalition is also working to fold its efforts into the work of other groups like the Capital Area Alliance for the Homeless and St. Vincent de Paul. Snelling Staffing, an employment agency, also has reached out to help.
The coalition—which includes the mayor’s office, the Downtown Development District, the Start Corporation and other agencies—knows the federal rental assistance currently supporting the housing initiative will eventually be exhausted, he says. The formerly homeless adults need support services to help them be successful.
“Employment is a huge piece of that,” Gaudet says. “In order to fully support them and make them successful, you try to find all these wrap-around services for them … it’s moving them into the workforce and making them tax-paying citizens.”
