Jenna lost her job after a car accident where she was injured and unable to work. As a single mom of two, the sudden lack of income had a dramatic impact on her ability to care for her family and stay current on her rent. As the medical bills piled up, Jenna faced difficult decisions between paying for medical expenses, rent and food.
With her savings nearly depleted, Jenna came to VEAP for food. As she was new to VEAP, Jenna met with Molly, a VEAP social worker, and shared that while she needed food today, she didn’t know how she was going to pay her next month’s rent. VEAP was able to help Jenna with her next month’s rent and made it possible for Jenna to make weekly visits to the food pantry for several weeks.
For this family, VEAP intervened at a critical moment and provided caring, professional support helping Jenna stabilize her financial situation and avoid homelessness. Homelessness is extremely disruptive to a community. It de-stabilizes the family unit and has an impact on the health of the family leading to long-term, devastating effects. The lack of housing that is affordable for low-income families is a mounting crisis. Average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Bloomington is $1,078 and with vacancy rates below 2% this creates an unfavorable environment for those seeking affordable, safe and dignified housing. VEAP clients in need of housing support typically spend over 80% of their income on rent leaving little for food, transportation, medication and other basic needs. Helping clients maintain safe, affordable housing promotes sustainable, healthy and thriving communities.
When you support VEAP, you help Jenna and hundreds of other families in our community. When families visit the VEAP food pantry, it frees up dollars for rent and other necessities. VEAP is able to leverage donated dollars where with every dollar donated, VEAP is able to purchase $10 worth of food from a local food bank. A donation of just $25 will feed a child for the summer.
Your donations can have an even bigger impact during the July Open Your Heart to the Hungry and Homeless Seventh Annual Food Shelf Challenge Grant. During July, Open Your Heart to the Hungry and Homeless will proportionally match donations to VEAP. The more you donate, the larger VEAP’s grant from Open Your Heart to the Hungry and Homeless will be.
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