NEWS ARCHIVE

(Clinton) -- Iowa Finance Authority awards over $900,000 grants statewide. Link included to state and county trends.

A couple of local organizations are benefiting as the Iowa Finance Authority awards grants for homeless services in Iowa. Organizations in fifteen communities receive funding to assist homeless services

The Iowa Finance Authority Board of Directors today awarded about $900,000 in grants to 27 organizations to assist homeless and domestic violence shelters with costs associated with providing essential services, emergency shelter operations and homelessness prevention services. The funding is made available through the Shelter Assistance Fund program.

Locally the Information, Referral and Assistance Services received $30,000. Regan Michaelsen of the agency said the funds will be used for homeless prevention efforts directed to help with emergency rent and utilities. She said this is the first time Information, Referral and Assistance Services has received funding in this program. The funds will be budgeted to stretch out for the year.

In addition-the Pathway Living Center in Clinton received $60,000 in a grant for homeless prevention efforts.

Shelter Assistance Fund applications are accepted on an annual basis and are judged through a competitive process. The Iowa Finance Authority received 39 eligible applications for the 2013 round requesting more than $1.3 million in funding. The program is funded with proceeds from the Real Estate Transfer Tax, of which $900,776 is available for the 2013 Shelter Assistance program.

The Iowa Council on Homelessness reports that 17,900 homeless Iowans were served by service providers throughout the state in 2011, which is a decline from 18,212 in 2010. Iowa’s homelessness assistance and prevention programs throughout the state assisted an unduplicated total of more than 44,607 Iowans in 2011.

State-wide and county-level trends are available at a link: IowaHomelessness.com

Written 1/11/2013 by Dave Vickers - KROS News

Back to Archives