What We Do
Family Shelter
At the North Star House, we provide shelter for families who have at least one minor child in their care. Families can access shelter for 30-90 days, receive case management services, and access the necessary resources to secure permanent housing.
Family Promise:
An Innovative Model
Across this country, communities offer hospitality to families through Family Promise Affiliates. The innovative model — using existing space like congregations and volunteers motivated by compassion —has helped hundreds of thousands of children and adults in our national network of 200+ Affiliates. Working with community resources, Family Promise Affiliates provide comprehensive and targeted services, including extensive case management, at 1/3 the cost of traditional shelter. Furthermore, Family Promise Affiliates serve families of all compositions, often providing their only shelter option in a community.
And it works.
On average, 88% of the people served in the shelter program secure housing within nine weeks. Because of the depth of services and community support, families stay housed, and Affiliates provide both prevention and stabilization services to increase their impact.
Family Shelter Program
Our Family Stabilization Program is an essential part of our family’s road to success. Families begin the intake process with a series of individual screening meetings that assists our case manager in determining if the family is a good fit for the program. Together, they develop goals and then break each one down in to workable steps. During the family’s stay in our shelter program, they meet many times a week with the case manager to review goals, plan subsequent steps, find resources, and determine realistic outcomes for themselves and their family. We focus on shared experiences and skill building in a home setting.
Families are far more receptive to learn when presented with information by people they know and trust. Therefore, our Life Skills classes are customized specifically to our families’ needs and offered at a convenient site. Life Skills focuses on empowering families to achieve and maintain independence. Topics include: parenting, safety, financial literacy, stress reduction, communication skills and professionalism. 90% of families that complete our Family Stabilization Program are successful in staying in their stable housing.
Previously known as Interfaith Hospitality Network, this essential group of volunteers have aided in the success of our Family Shelter Program from the start. By donating all the time, labor and supplies to feed and provide activities for our guests, they continue to form the backbone of our organization as a collaboration of faith communities striving to fulfill our mission.
HOW IT WORKS
The resources are already there. In the community, there are caring people and organizations that want to help make a difference. With volunteers giving their time, making meals, and sharing hospitality, family homelessness is addressed without the burdensome cost of hiring a multi-person staff. Across the country, people have realized that this innovative approach truly makes a difference for families experiencing homelessness—and more than 200,000 volunteers.
These volunteers are the core of the program. They share food, spend the night, play with children and lend their passion and expertise to help families get back on their feet. They prove that motivated people can solve family homelessness. And, in the process, they truly create “home” – and a community – for families who have no place left to turn.
A COMMUNITY RESPONSE
In every community, these core elements exist. By bringing the community together on the issue of family homelessness, Family Promise addresses a major social problem in a holistic, effective way. Once the community becomes engaged, people understand the root causes of family homelessness and take steps to address them. Family Promise Affiliates have created more than 1,700 community initiatives—housing programs, homelessness prevention, childcare and much more—that target the issues of poverty and homelessness on a local level.
A LONG-TERM SOLUTION
Not only does our 88% success rate mean many more families stably housed, it is also a tremendous cost saving to the community as diversion from far more expensive interventions. Our approach of keeping families together, identifying their strengths, and partnering with the community for solutions means that families are at much lower risk of returning to homelessness.
THE BOTTOM LINE
Family Promise changes lives. We served 126,000 parents and children last year, giving them the ability to realize their true potential. We also change the lives of our 200,000 volunteers, giving them a meaningful outreach right in their own communities.