Right now, Open Door houses 30 people in its permanent housing program and this addition will bring that number to 45.
“Since 2017, when our program kicked off, we have had a 100 percent retention rate which means no one in our housing program has returned to homelessness,” Chad Wheeler, executive director of Open Door said.
Wheeler says they won’t stop until they end chronic homelessness in the hub city.
It’s mission is to help people who’ve been homeless for more than a year and may have a disability.
“Because of the fact that we are targeting some of the most vulnerable people in the streets, the experiences are very different from person to person,” Wheeler said. “Some people we move into housing, they have severe disabilities.”
This addition is expected to drop homelessness by 34 percent.
Open Door resident, Jaime Barrera says he used to live on the streets but has enjoyed having a home of his own, the best part, having a bed.
“It helps a lot for a lot of our people out here because some people wanna changes their life, you know. and when you have a house, you can really do a lot of things,” Barrera said. “It took a while for me to sleep in my bed, but I got used to it because I was always on the ground.”
There are things you can do to help the organization, right now Wheeler says they are in need of furniture and household items.
“One of the things we’re trying to do right now, is get community support for the furnishing of the next 15 people moving in to housing, which we’re about to, yesterday we moved the first of the next 15 in to housing, that’s gonna be taking place over the next few months,” Wheeler said.
For Barrera, the thing he enjoys the most is getting to cook in his own kitchen.
“I enjoy cooking a lot in the kitchen, that’s my thing is the kitchen,” Barrera said.
For more information on how to donate items, visit opendoorlbk.org.
