猫咪社区

At the grocery store, pick up barbecue sauce, a jar of spaghetti sauce, elbow noodles, and a chicken breast鈥攚ithout the bone. 

When you get home, boil water for noodles and add some barbecue sauce to the pot, for flavor. Fry your chicken. 

Pour the noodles into a bowl. Add chicken. Add spaghetti sauce. 

Voila! Joseph 鈥淛.W.鈥� Harris Jr.鈥檚 special recipe for Southern-style barbecue chicken spaghetti. It鈥檚 one of the many dishes he鈥檚 been crafting since moving into his home in . The low-income housing apartment complex in Wichita, Kansas, is run by  for people transitioning out of homelessness. The ability to make his own meals is one of the best parts about his new apartment, Harris said.

鈥淵ou can cook your own stuff,鈥� he said. 鈥淵ou鈥檙e more independent here.鈥� 

Harris, 46, moved into The Studios last fall using an emergency housing voucher. These provide rental assistance funded by the  for . But the vouchers, which were meant to provide relief during the pandemic, are vastly underutilized. As of March 15, only  are being used to lease apartments. 

Challenges, including a  and skyrocketing rents, have made it difficult for those who receive vouchers to find housing. Plus, the emergency voucher program has 鈥渁dded complexity,鈥� according to Brian Handshy, regional public affairs officer for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. That鈥檚 because it requires close collaboration between government and , like nonprofits. 

Wichita, though, stands out with its success in the voucher program. About  are currently used to help residents rent apartments, according to federal data as of March 15. This gives Wichita the second-highest utilization rate among the  at using emergency housing vouchers. 

The Solution

Hurricane Katrina hit Harris鈥� hometown of Meridian, Mississippi, in 2005. 

The storm鈥檚 path of destruction left him homeless. His work in the oil fields dried up in its aftermath.

鈥淎fter Hurricane Katrina hit, a lot of Mississippi people and Louisiana people, a lot of people from down there, started moving up this way,鈥� Harris said. 

He came to Kansas in 2010, knowing no one. Since then, Harris has been in and out of permanent housing, co-workers鈥� homes, and shelters. Last summer, he reached the 30-day limit of a shelter where he was staying. He moved downtown and stayed at , a shelter run by HumanKind Ministries. 

Around the same time, the Wichita Housing Authority was preparing to distribute its emergency housing vouchers, which became available on July 1, 2021. The agency wanted to distribute them as quickly as possible鈥攁nd the housing authority had two tricks up its sleeve, according to Sally Stang, director of Wichita鈥檚 Housing and Community Services Department.

The first one?

鈥淲e were two years ahead,鈥� Stang said.

The emergency housing voucher program  agencies that work with people experiencing homelessness or fleeing domestic violence, like HumanKind, to refer potential voucher recipients to the housing authority, which then approves that person for an emergency voucher.

The initiative requires coordination between nonprofits and the housing authority鈥攕omething Wichita had in place prior to the emergency voucher program. In 2020, the Wichita Housing Authority established the . This allows homeless service providers to refer homeless people to the city鈥檚 already-existing housing choice voucher program and be popped to the top of the list. The city receives  that are separate from the emergency housing vouchers.

When the Wichita Housing Authority received the emergency vouchers in 2021, nonprofits already had infrastructure in place to communicate with the city about who was homeless and in need.

鈥淚 kind of laugh about it, because we set up what we call our homeless preference program, and it works very similar鈥� to the emergency voucher program, Stang said. 

Then, there was The Studios, where Harris lives now. This project filled in a major part of the puzzle鈥攐nce someone gets a voucher, where do they go?

鈥淔or us, it wasn鈥檛 a challenge, because the facility [The Studios] was right there, literally ready and waiting for people,鈥� said Emily Lohfink, marketing and communications manager with HumanKind.

The city decided in December 2020 to use nearly  of federal COVID relief funds to buy a former hotel and renovate the facility into permanent housing, now known as The Studios. The apartment complex on North Topeka Avenue specifically targets helping those experiencing homelessness. .

The Studios opened on Oct. 4, 2021. Harris moved in the same day. Twenty-seven of the 54 units are filled with residents using emergency housing vouchers, Stang said. 

鈥淵ou have to keep all your meetings. You have to do the right thing. You really got to want this for yourself,鈥� Harris said. 鈥淚t comes down to that, as a homeless person. You really gotta want to do it.鈥� 

鈥淧rivate Landlords Kind of Shy Away鈥�

When Harris learned in late August that he was getting an emergency housing voucher, he spent time calling apartment complexes that he heard might be a fit. 

But outside of The Studios, he had no success. One complex he called wouldn鈥檛 accept his emergency voucher. 

鈥淭hat kind of put a turn on me,鈥� Harris said. 鈥淵ou only got a certain amount of days.鈥�

The emergency housing voucher comes with a deadline鈥攊f you don鈥檛 find housing within  of receiving it, you lose it. Agencies that worked with clients who received the vouchers said it was a challenge to find landlords who would accept them.

鈥淓arly on, a lot of landlords and apartment complexes didn鈥檛 really know what this was,鈥� said Keri McGregor, program director at Harbor House, which works with domestic violence survivors. 鈥淎nd I think they were hesitant to accept something when the participant isn鈥檛 able to pay for it on their own. I think private landlords kind of shy away from that.鈥�

Stang said building The Studios was one part of the solution to this problem. So is an  that provides landlords with support when leasing to tenants who experienced homelessness. 

Even though finding housing could be a challenge, McGregor said she didn鈥檛 know of anyone whose voucher expired because they couldn鈥檛 find housing. Neither did Tracey Gay, director of client services for the Wichita Family Crisis Center.

This success may have been helped by Wichita鈥檚 housing market. Average rent in Wichita is less than half the national average as of . And according to , Wichita鈥檚 rental vacancy rate is 9.7%鈥攁bout 62% higher than the national vacancy rate. This vacancy rate is higher than what鈥檚 considered healthy, according to Kirk McClure, a professor emeritus at the University of Kansas who studies housing.

What Lies Ahead

After years of rotating between living situations, Harris said he plans to stay at The Studios for the foreseeable future.

The emergency housing vouchers allow this, Stang said. Tenants can use them through .

鈥淲e鈥檝e had discussions about鈥攚hat do we do in 2030?鈥� Stang said.

But for the time being, Harris has a lot of goals he is working toward. And he鈥檚 starting with teaching cooking classes at The Studios. He wants to share how he makes meals with just a microwave, toaster oven, and electric skillet.

Southern-style barbecue chicken spaghetti is just the beginning.

This story was originally published in the and is republished here as part of the SoJo Exchange from the , a nonprofit organization dedicated to rigorous reporting about responses to social problems.