A new idea to curb chronic homelessness? Columbia set to launch shelter village

By Nov. 1, a village of pallet shelters built for chronically homeless residents in Columbia will be open for business, announcing a new era in how the city serves some of its most vulnerable.

The village, called Rapid Shelter Columbia, will have 50 shelters reserved for adults who have been homeless for a year or longer. Each shelter will be single-occupancy, allowing residents privacy and a space of their own.

In a city where homelessness has often been called a crisis but where solutions have fallen short of providing long term care to residents in need, some advocates say this is a novel approach capable of making real change.

“We’re going to be focusing on where the client is, dealing with their trauma whatever that trauma is, dealing with their mental health and substance use,” said Kameisha Heppard, the city’s new director of homeless services.

Once those areas in a person’s life are stabilized, they’ll be in a better position to find transitional housing, Heppard added.

City leaders announced the new program in September and have rushed to get the village ready before winter.

Residents at Rapid Shelter Columbia will be able to stay for up to 90 days while also being directly connected with health care and other resources. The site has been set up at the city’s former Inclement Weather Center at 191 Calhoun St. (The city will still allow residents to seek shelter at the site between Nov. 1 and April 1 when temperatures fall below 40 degrees, but will rename that service Rapid Shelter Columbia Overflow.)

The effort is part of a roughly $3 million overhaul of homeless services provided by the city. The work is a shift from the city’s previous partnership with United Way, which the city contracted to run the inclement weather center. Now, all of the city’s homeless services are being operated in-house by Heppard and her team, which will have seven people once she is done hiring new employees.

Heppard, who started her new job Monday, says the key ingredient to make the pallet village successful will be outreach, not only from the city but from the various other entities that connect with homeless residents, including the Columbia Area Mental Health Center, the Mental Illness Recovery Center Inc. and Cooperative Health.

Heppard previously worked as the vice president for programs at Transitions Homeless Center in downtown Columbia and is already well-connected with those and other programs that will be needed to make Rapid Shelter Columbia successful, she said.

Some of those partners will bring their services directly to the residents. For example, Heppard is hoping to have primary health care services available at the rapid shelter site at least once a week.

Members of City Council have said the Rapid Shelter Columbia site is ideal to allow food programs, health care providers, job resources and agencies like the Veterans Affairs to have a central location to serve residents.

Another void Rapid Shelter Columbia seeks to fill is the need for after-hours services, which most area service providers have said were nonexistent in the city.

Heppard is also trained in trauma-informed care, which city leaders say makes her particularly qualified to work with chronically homeless residents.

City Council members, including Aditi Bussells, who led the city’s task force that ultimately launched the pallet shelter program, say this is a first step until the city can identify longer-term programs for homeless residents.

There are an estimated 250 people in Columbia who are chronically homeless, meaning they have been homeless for a year or longer.

Heppard acknowledges connecting with many of those residents will be a challenge.

“We’ll be working with a population that is resilient, and they are usually resistant to come in for services,” she said. “We know there is hard work before us. We’re here to do things differently and see if that brings about a change.”

Part of the effort to reach those residents includes directly and repeatedly making contact with them to build a rapport, she said.

For security, the city has contracted a private firm that will be on site 24 hours a day, Columbia Police Chief Skip Holbrook said at a press briefing.