Nevada is receiving more than $15 million from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD, to serve the homeless. Volunteers of America Northern Nevada, or VOA, is one recipient of the funding.
Sandy Isham is a spokeswoman with VOA.
“These HUD grants that we receive are critically important because they allow us to provide case management and also permanent supportive housing for these clients,” Isham says.
Isham says HUD funding helps provide housing and and psychiatric treatment.
“Affordable housing is a huge need, but just as importantly, mental health services are a huge need," Isham says. "Some people have estimated that almost half of the homeless in our Washoe County area have some sort of mental illness.”
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JuliannaGlock is also with VOA and says the nonprofit recently received about $800 thousand to continue a program called“ANCHOR,” which provides permanent supportive housing to those with mental illness.
“Permanent supportive housing is just that, it’s permanent housing," Glock says. "Their rent is subsidized through HUD funds and the supportive piece for our program is the mental health services and case management. That’s how we support them to stay in permanent housing and become self-sufficient.”
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Glock says HUD funding covers about 80 percent of the cost to run ANCHOR, which provides more than 70 housing units in Washoe County to shelter families or individuals.
The VOA has also been searching for a new location for its overflow shelter, which closed in February. That shelter was serving more than 100 chronically homeless people.