Bedding, clothing, a bar of soap, a pair of boots lay along the Merrimack River. Clearly, this is a home for people who have lost theirs.
In 2008, state agencies identified about 250 homeless veterans in New Hampshire. About 56 live in Manchester.
In 2010, New Hampshire unveiled a four-year strategy to end homelessness among veterans and statistics show significant progress.
This month, nine previously homeless veterans and their families are settling into brand new apartments thanks to a wide reaching team effort.
“I was homeless for four years,” said Rocky David, a former Marine who served two years in Vietnam.
“I was walking the streets, sleeping in abandoned cars. I was sleeping in abandoned buildings. I was sleeping in Dumpsters. I was sleeping down by the river,” he said.
David remembers the night he almost died. He was in the park trying to keep warm. Snow was falling and he dozed off.
When he woke up, he said six inches of snow was coating his body and a police officer was prodding him.
“I said, ‘I ain't going nowhere. Arrest me. I don't care. I'll be in a pretty warm cell,’” he said. “Next morning, they released me. I was walking out, and he was sitting in his cruiser and said, ‘Come here.’ I said, ‘Hey, I did my time.’ He said, ‘No, come get in the cruiser,’ and he took me over to The Way Home.”
David now has a kitchen, a breakfast nook and even a small yard with a grill. He is on a mission to get other homeless veterans to find their “way home.”
He even serves on the board of directors for the nonprofit. He offered some thoughts at the Dec. 7 ribbon cutting of nine apartments dedicated to homeless vets and their families on Hanover Street in Manchester.
“It puts tears in my eyes to know that you people think this much of your vets,” he said.
Just a year ago, the bright, cheery building was a blight in the Queen City. The previous owner racked up $60,000 in city fines for failing for months to fix numerous code violations and hazards. Elm Grove Properties bought 455 Hanover St. a year ago with broken windows, damaged electrical wires and trash in every room.
“This was a property that was derelict, that police and fire and the building inspector had to come by and make sure things were not deteriorating further, that there wasn't crime here,” said Newton Kershaw, from Elm Grove.
Elm Grove Properties has been teaming up with the The Way Home for a decade now to offer solutions to those who've run out of options. This Hanover Street project perhaps the crown jewel.
“Elm Grove, a private developer, has taken on these buildings and turned them around into wonderful properties, and they're invested in the mission,” said Mary Sliney, executive director of “The Way Home.”
Here's how it works: Elm Grove Properties purchased the foreclosed building, which is financed through a local bank. The community improvement loan is a no-interest deferred loan that only has to be paid off if the property is sold. The Department of Housing and Urban Development gave $90,000 for lead paint abatement, and the rent is subsidized through vouchers from the Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing.
“This is another wonderful example of the City of Manchester working with local nonprofits and private businesses and using money from the federal government to pull together wonderful programs like this,” said Gregory Carlson, with the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The Bartlett family is decked out for the holidays in their new home. The family of five was crammed into a two-bedroom apartment in Franklin, and before that, the Gulf War veteran and his family were on the streets.
“We've come a long way. We came from sleeping in a van in a Walmart parking lot in the middle of winter to a four-bedroom apartment in less than two years,” said veteran Brett Bartlett.
Residents pay one-third of their income for rent and can live there as long as they like, but Veterans Affairs staffers said they're already getting questions from veteran families on steps they can take toward home ownership.
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