Family Promise seeks advice on fighting homelessness

Family Promise of the Palouse officials are looking to use a $20,000 grant to combat homelessness in rural Latah County, but they first asked Latah County commissioners Wednesday for their insight on homelessness in order to develop a plan to spend the money.

Bruce Pitman, president of the board of directors for FPP in Moscow, said the nonprofit organization, which provides shelter to homeless families and helps them maintain independence when they find a residence of their own, applied for and received a grant from the Steele-Reese Foundation to help prevent homelessness in Latah County.

Pitman said the foundation serves rural areas, and Moscow is not considered rural by the foundation’s definition, so the money will be directed toward rural Latah County towns and unincorporated areas of the county.

Pitman said FPP’s original proposal for the grant was to invite families to seek case management services that FPP offers, but the plan did not really get off the ground.

He said FPP asked to send the grant money back to the foundation, but foundation officials told the Moscow nonprofit to seek other ideas to spend the money, which prompted Wednesday’s meeting with the commissioners.

Commissioner Tom Lamar advised Pitman and other FPP representatives to contact school principals, city clerks and sheriff’s office deputies in the county to learn about the homelessness problems those towns face.

Lamar said building relationships with people at senior meal sites in the county would be instrumental as well.

Latah County Sheriff Richie Skiles said homelessness in the county mostly includes “couch hoppers” who move from house to house of family members and friends. Some families live in campers, too.

Commissioner Kathie LaFortune suggested earmarking the grant money for a couple of communities that are most affected by homelessness instead of the entire county because $20,000 will only make a small impact if spread to multiple towns.

Lamar said it is probably easiest to focus efforts on incorporated county towns instead of unincorporated areas of the county because systems are already in place to potentially address homelessness.

Pitman said he liked the idea of selecting a pocket of the county most in need of homelessness services, pay attention to those needs and then ask the Steele-Reese Foundation for grant money to replicate those efforts in other parts of the county.

Lamar said the results of Idaho’s 16th annual Point-In-Time count, which was conducted Jan. 22 by the Balance of State Continuum of Care and coordinated by the Idaho Housing and Finance Association, will likely come out in the next few weeks. The PIT count provides a one-night snapshot of the number of homeless people in Idaho, including each county’s statistics.

LaFortune recommended contacting the local branch of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare to find out how many people have been accessing homelessness and poverty services.

Skiles said the Salvation Army and Sojourners’ Alliance in Moscow typically know of families who need help as well.

Garrett Cabeza can be reached at (208) 883-4631, or by email to gcabeza@dnews.com.