Home Sweet Home Ministries plans to begin negotiations to acquire the site for a proposed shelter village, now that the Bloomington nonprofit's plan to help the unhoused has won the unanimous support of the city council.
In a 9-0 vote, the city council on Monday backed the concept of The Bridge, a village of close to 50 small sleeping cabins to be built south of downtown.
That endorsement does not come with direct financial support, but Home Sweet Home CEO Matt Burgess said the city's backing still means a lot.
“Having our city council unanimously endorse this location provides a lot of reassurance to Connect Transit and to Home Sweet Home Ministries,” Burgess said in an interview on WGLT’s Sound Ideas.
Connect Transit owns the 1.75 acres where its headquarters once stood. Managing director David Braun has said the transit agency was waiting for approval from the city – one of its primary funders – before entering into negotiations.
The Bloomington City Council also called on the Town of Normal to adopt a similar resolution of support — a sentiment Burgess welcomed.
“Homelessness, in particular, unsheltered homelessness, really is a communitywide issue,” Burgess said.
Some unhoused residents staying in tents along Sugar Creek in Normal are among those needing a place to stay. They are about to get kicked off the property for a sewer project.
Burgess said they are among the approximately 50 Bloomington-Normal area residents who are currently unsheltered, though more then 250 people have been unhoused at different times throughout the year in the community.
“The shelter village is being designed and built to prioritize people in that exact situation,” Burgess said.
Burgess said he hopes the 48 cabins [40 single and 8 double bed units] will be enough to house everyone who needs a bed in Bloomington-Normal, but if not, they will prioritize “the people who are most in need, who are the most vulnerable, who are the most at-risk, who are outside.”
He said the 80- and 100-square-foot sleeping cabins may especially benefit people needing transitional housing who struggled in the congregant setting of the Home Sweet Home’s shelter.
The site won't be ready until November at the earliest, however. Burgess said Home Sweet Home expects to have detailed plans to the city by the end of the week and his “ambitious” plan is to begin construction next month.
Burgess said Home Sweet Home will soon expand fundraising efforts for the $2.65 million project. It's planning a mix of public and private funds to build and to operate. That cost does not include property acquisition, which Burgess said would come from Home Sweet Home's capital reserves.
He said initial operating costs will likely be about $700,000 annually, which the nonprofit hopes to cover with donations along with funding from McLean County and the state and federal governments.
Addressing homelessness
While the Bloomington City Council unanimously backed the shelter village plan, council member Sheila Montney asked during Monday's meeting why the community has seen such a significant increase in its homeless population in recent years.
Burgess, who was unable to attend the meeting due to a work conflict, said Tuesday that the growth in homelessness can be linked almost entirely to the community's housing shortage.
"It's not a complex situation to try to figure out," Burgess said. "When housing is inaccessible either because there isn't available inventory or because it is not affordable, homeless rates increase in communities where those factors are true."
