ANDERSON COUNTY, Tenn. — A nonprofit in Anderson County is taking a housing-first approach to homelessness in the area, getting families off the street quickly so they can recover faster and find stable housing.
The Tennessee Out-Reach Center for Homeless, or TORCH, said they are working to help families with children and are placing them into single-family housing owned by the nonprofit. The group said it owns two temporary housing units named Agape House and Bookhart Village, which can temporarily house up to nine families.
The Oak Ridge Housing Authority manages the facilities on TORCH's behalf. ORHA facilitates rental agreements, conducts monthly inspections, and makes sure the units are kept clean for future residents.
TORCH said most nonprofits and advocacy groups approach homelessness by placing families in emergency shelters where they live until temporary housing becomes available. They may then live in temporary housing for up to two years before they move into a permanent residence.
TORCH also said there is no emergency shelter in Anderson County, and so families need to go to a shelter in Knox County or be placed in another communal living facility. Their new housing-first approach bypasses the need for those kinds of shelters.
Most of TORCH's families stay in a temporary housing unit for around six months, and they said they use the waiting list for public housing as their measure for how long a family can stay in a unit.
During their stay, TORCH case managers are able to devote time to helping families find any help they need to secure permanent homes.
“Our motto is that, 'No child sleeps outside.’ It’s been our vision that a child who is homeless may never even know they were homeless in the first place,” said Andy O’Quinn, the executive director of TORCH. “There are very few places for families with children to go to when they become homeless. We challenged our community in Anderson County to help us provide something for these families and they delivered.”