By JUDD WEIL
Hutch Post
SOUTH HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Interfaith Housing and Community Services has taken a major step for their new Veteran Housing Project thanks to a generous donation of $20,000 from Cargill and the Central Kansas Veteran Community Partnership (CKVCP). The announcement came on Flag Day, June 14.
With the grant, the pre-development costs for the new Patriot Place, to be located in South Hutchinson, has been funded.
"This has been a long time coming in multiple directions. This has been prayed for," Raechel Manley with First National Bank of Hutchinson said. "This has been brought to fruition by many organizations and hopes. When we saw that there was a need, and Interfaith stepped up and found a way to make it happen."
Providing safe and affordable housing, mostly for seniors, has been Interfaith’s mission since its founding in 1989. Interfaith, as a 501(c)(3) non-profit, runs on donations, volunteers and grant funding.
Their most recently completed project was the LightHouse housing and resource program for young adults.
According to Clint Nelson, Interfaith Housing CEO, the land for Patriot Place was acquired from Steve Schowalter, and the house on it was removed and the land was scraped.
"We are seeking to develop a 1000 square foot community room and 20 units surround that community room," Nelson said. "These we smaller units, efficiency units, one-bedroom units. Master-metered, so when we have our clients move in, they don’t have to worry about setting up utilities. We’re going to scale the rent accordingly and in a lot of cases that will likely be no rent in coming in."
Nelson looks forward to continuing the partnerships that have made Patriot Place more of a reality in the community.
"We are certainly going to continue to seek out partnerships with the CKVCP, with the VA, VFW, Knights of Columbus, and all the other agencies that we know are going to be bringing strength to this project," Nelson said. "As with any of these high mission projects, there are some early expenses that are sometimes hard to cover when you're talking about architectural work, design, zoning, and some of those things. With this commitment from Cargill, we will be able to fully fund our predevelopment work and we're off and running to see this project actually come to fruition."
According to Danny Wilson with Cargill, the Cargill Cares Council worked with an almost $80,000 budget in the last few years that they were able to put into grants for things like Patriot Place. In their last fiscal year, Cargill was able to turn that money into $120,000.
"With donations from corporate, we can get a 100% match, so we take $10,000 generally when we do a grant out of our local," Wilson said. "That’s why we’re excited to give this $20,000 check to the CKVCP."
For more information about Interfaith Housing and Communities Services, and to inquire about updates about the Veteran Housing Project, contact them at (620) 662-8370 or email them at [email protected].
To contact the Central Kansas Veteran Community Partnership for questions or concerns, email them at [email protected].
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