Tacoma program uses housing to promote good parenting, self-sufficiency, By Rob Carson, May 19, 2013, Tacoma News Tribune: “When Mike and Shawna Allen first heard about the McCarver Program, the deal sounded too good to be true. The Allens were close to desperation at the time — crammed into a Tacoma homeless shelter with three small children, no money and no prospect of jobs. The deal was this: The Tacoma Housing Authority would give them and 49 other homeless families practically free homes for a year — their rent would be $25 a month. Each year during the five-year program, the families’ contributions to their housing costs would increase by 20 percent, until they’d be paying the full price in the sixth year. During that time, they’d have access to job training, parenting classes, child care, counselors to help them work through lingering drug and mental health issues, plus an array of other social and health services. All the Allens and the other families had to do in return was enroll their kids at McCarver Elementary School, on Tacoma’s Hilltop, and keep them there through fifth grade…”
Poverty-related issues in the news, from the Institute for Research on Poverty