April 14, 2020
To our community:
This past month has been a whirlwind. We have all made many sacrifices in order to slow the spread of COVID-19 and keep each other safe and healthy. From the local news, our collective efforts may be working as Oregon appears on track to flatten the curve of the pandemic over the coming weeks.
As this hopeful message settles in, we remain vigilant in service to seniors, veterans, people with disabilities, and families with children who are living on limited incomes. As is being reported, this pandemic is impacting lower income people at high rates, and people of color at even higher rates.
Much has happened in the last four weeks, and we wanted to provide an update from NHA on what we’ve been doing:
- Our front line staff continue to provide essential services to residents in NHA properties. Our Resident Services team is now providing food to our residents who are staying home to stay safe, and we are delivering medications and other necessities to those who need assistance.
- The Annie Ross House family emergency shelter remains in full operation with some modifications to facilitate social distancing. We are currently at full capacity with 8 families.
- There are no confirmed cases of COVID-19 among residents of our properties or among any of the guests at the Annie Ross House family emergency shelter.
- Through our HomeBase program one family from the Annie Ross House recently moved into permanent housing—an incredible feat at any time, but especially given current circumstances.
- HomeBase staff also helped another homeless family from the Clackamas Housing Assistance referral process to move into permanent housing.
- Construction projects remain on budget and on time. With nearly 500 units of affordable housing in some phase of the construction process, we are grateful that construction crews are staying safe while continuing to work, and that our financial partners are providing flexibility to keep each project on track.
- NHA’s executive director, Trell Anderson, provided public testimony in support of the Clackamas County Community Development Block Grant plan which paves the way for federal funding investment in local communities.
- We are supporting the HereTogether campaign to pass the Metro bond measure for homeless services. If passed, this will be a game changer to move more people from homelessness to housing with appropriate levels of supportive services.
- We received a generous grant from the Yarg Foundation to support rising program costs because of COVID.
- Although we had to cancel our spring fundraiser, the Lake Oswego Lake Run, many of our event sponsors have generously donated their sponsorships to support our programs. Thank you to LMC Construction, Kaiser Permanente, First Interstate Bank, WARN Industries, Pacific West Bank, Benchmark Partners, Churchill Mortgage, Milwaukie Rotary Club, Lane Powell, Rose Kilpatrick, Providence, Moda Health, Clackamas County Bank, Mary’s Woods, and Morrissey Financial for continuing to support NHA’s programs during this difficult time.
While these past few weeks have been challenging, we have also witnessed the resiliency and generosity of our partners, staff, and those we serve and for that, we are grateful and encouraged. We offer special thanks to health care workers, those who are supporting seniors in group living, those working to keep the supply of food bountiful, those working for the US Postal Service, and many more who remain committed to essential services.
The NHA staff is working side-by-side with you to provide opportunity through housing, to prevent homelessness, to end homeless for individual families, and to build more affordable homes in local communities across Oregon.
