Special Series
This is the fourth story in Spotlight Delaware’s five-part series examining homelessness in the First State. Read Part 1 here. Part 2 here. Part 3 here. If you or someone you how are experiencing homelessness, available resources can be found here.
Why Should Delaware Care?
Policymakers and advocates in Delaware say permanent supportive housing is needed for people experiencing homelessness. But they face a skeptical federal government that argues such programs create dependency.
Last month, a who’s who of New Castle County power brokers milled about the lobby of what once was a Sheraton hotel. With melodies from a jazz trio playing softly in the background, they celebrated the fifth anniversary of turning the hotel into the Hope Center homeless shelter.
In the floors above, scores of people who previously had been homeless were likely winding down their days. Among them were 17 veterans and chronically homeless people who live on the fifth floor and call the Hope Center their permanent home.
Those fifth-floor rooms are critical to combatting Delaware’s growing housing crisis, say advocates, because they are some of the few examples in the state of supportive housing, which provides a permanent place to stay along with services, such as doctor’s visits and addiction treatment.
“Everybody wants to be on the fifth floor,” said Lawrence LaValley, one of the permanent residents there.
But in recent months, that model has been challenged by federal government officials who are pulling back dollars for that type of housing, even as local advocates say it should be expanded.
“Those resources are super, super limited and not meeting most of the people out there who need them,” said Rachel Stucker, executive director of the Housing Alliance of Delaware.
Supportive housing is an example of a “housing first” model, which provides permanent housing to homeless people without requiring sobriety or mental health treatment.
Stucker said this model works because it is difficult to address mental health or addiction issues without first having a stable place to live.
But the Trump administration, which supplies money for housing programs in all 50 states, argues that funding transitional housing programs with time limits and mandates for mental health and addiction treatment is a better approach.
Last fall, U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner argued that housing first programs “neglect to address the root causes of homelessness, including illicit drugs and mental illness.”
In a press release, he said the programs “incentivized never-ending government dependency” rather than allowing people to be self-sufficient.
The federal cabinet secretary also hinted at what has become the politically charged nature of the debate, calling dollars for housing first a “Biden-era slush fund.”
In response to such arguments, Delaware State Housing Authority Director Matthew Heckles said government officials already tried requiring homeless people to get sober and be treated for mental health before being sheltered, and it was not effective.
The results were that people simply chose – or were forced – to stay on the streets, he said.
“They’re basically going back in time and saying, ‘These things that we know don’t work, that’s how we think you should do things,’” Heckles said.
A Rhode Island judge recently issued a temporary injunction on the Trump administration’s actions. The case is ongoing.
Finding hope on the fifth floor
While the Hope Center is lauded as an example of an emergency shelter, few know about those who call it their permanent home.
Asked why it is an attractive option for long-term living, LaValley stressed something that may appear minor for many who live in traditional housing.
“We’re allowed to have hot plates,” he said.
Also on the fifth floor is Keith Stubbs, who previously lived in a van, saying he had trouble finding an apartment with a felony record.
He noted that on the streets he was harshly judged. But at the Hope Center, there is a community of military veterans who take care of each other, he said.
“On the streets, people are real. They tell you how they feel about you. You know, ‘Get a job,’ and all this,” Stubbs said, wiping away a tear. “And I worked 30 years for the federal government.”
Stubbs stayed for a time at a house for homeless veterans in Wilmington, but it was a temporary shelter, meaning he could only stay for 90 days. When his time was up, he came to the Hope Center.
Stubbs said he appreciates that the staff understand his struggles with mental health. For example, he does not eat in the dining hall there, saying it’s too overwhelming.
“I told them I got issues, and they respect my issues,” Stubbs said.
The Hope Center has a mental health and substance abuse clinic on site, with peer specialists, counselors, social workers and a psychiatrist. There is also a ChristianaCare clinic in what used to be the hotel’s Presidential Suite.
Stubbs said he plans to improve his credit so he can start his own veteran’s house, like the one he stayed at previously. But he plans to stay at the Hope Center for the time being.
“This is the best place, the safest place for me,” he said.
LaValley also is a veteran who first came to stay temporarily. He has stayed at other homeless shelters, but said he did not feel safe in any of them until coming to the Hope Center, which has around-the-clock security.
When he found out about permanent housing on the fifth floor, LaValley decided he wanted to stay. He said he enjoys living in the company of other veterans, and plans to live there long term.
“I’m happy here,” LaValley said.
New Castle County’s Community Services General Manager Carrie Casey said she would be content if some residents stayed at the Hope Center for the rest of their lives. She said she feels connected to them, and she thinks that for some the center is the most efficient use of public resources.
“They’re not clogging up the emergency room,” Casey said. “They’re not being arrested…By housing them, it actually costs a lot less money.”
A 2023 post from the Department of Housing and Urban Development stated that housing first initiatives have been proven to reduce the use of high-cost services.
Casey said “quite a few” of the people who stay in the Hope Center’s temporary shelter would want to stay there long-term if more rooms were available.
She would convert some of the Hope Center’s emergency shelter space into more permanent housing, but the federal government recently pulled a $10 million grant for an expansion because of opposition to housing first programs, she said.
Additionally, if housing-first funding cuts go through, the Hope Center will lose another $125,000 dedicated to its fifth-floor housing. Casey said she may have to pull from other revenue sources to fund the program.
“We’ll figure out a way to keep it going,” Casey said.
Central YMCA provides refuge
Above the gym in downtown Wilmington’s Central YMCA are 180 low-cost rooms for single men to rent that follow a similar model to the permanent housing inside the Hope Center.
Residents pay $525 a month for a 100-square-foot room and help from caseworkers to connect with mental health services, job training and affordable housing opportunities.
One of the residents, Julius Hardy, said he became homeless after losing his job at Amazon due to a workplace injury. He said he once had to pretend to have a drug addiction because rehabilitation programs were the only form of housing he could find.
Hardy said he appreciates the support from the YMCA staff members.
“Sometimes you drift off when you see where you’re at – where you were,” Hardy said. “But I can talk to any of the staff, talk about anything. They basically help me out, get me right, talk to me, keep me straight.”
Hardy has lived at the YMCA for a year and a half. And he said he wants to eventually leave the center so he can have his own kitchen, instead of cooking food in a shared microwave or crockpot.
But before looking for permanent housing, Hardy said he needs to be cleared by a doctor to work.
Central YMCA Program Director Jimia Redden said there is no hard deadline to leave, and some residents will likely stay there long-term.
Unlike the Hope Center’s permanent housing program, there is a goal to have residents leave after about two to three years — the same timeframe as the state’s waitlist for accessing affordable housing.
If the Trump administration’s housing first funding cuts are ultimately approved by the courts, though, the rooms that are federally funded may have to become transitional housing, which has a time limit of two years.
Redden said there would still be flexibility for those who are working toward finding housing but haven’t found it yet.
“We don’t want anybody to just settle,” Redden said.
For 10 years, Pedro Vicente lived on the streets of New York City. He said he didn’t mind it for a while. But he eventually found the Central YMCA in Wilmington because he feared he would have started using drugs if he stayed in New York longer.
“I was getting to the point that I was getting real anxious to do something … But coming here, I relax,” Vicente said. “I sit down, read my books. I love to draw. That’s what’s keeping me out of trouble.”
Vicente said he has stayed at other shelters, but they often had issues with people using drugs. The Central YMCA, he said, is “a little calmer with the drugs and alcohol.”
Redden said there is no requirement to be sober to live at the Central YMCA, but it is a drug-and-alcohol-free building. She said that is because she believes in the housing-first model.
“We are firm believers that when you’re housed, everything else will come into play and fall into place,” she said.
A waitlist of thousands
Vicente is currently on a wait list for a federal rental assistance voucher, known as a Section 8 voucher, in which the recipient pays 30% of their income toward rent and the government covers the rest.
When asked whether Delaware has availability in its Section 8 program, Heckles, the state’s housing director, picked up a small piece of paper from his desk.
Written on it was the number 26,486.
It was the number of people on the state’s centralized waiting list for assistance from Delaware’s five housing authorities, which run the state’s public housing and voucher programs.
DSHA Director of Public Relations Ashley Dawson prints out a new one almost every day as a reminder of how long the list has grown.
The people currently in permanent supportive housing would likely have to join the list if the housing-first funding cuts are approved, which would make it even longer, Dawson said.
But Heckles said for those who apply, receiving housing assistance is not as simple as waiting in line. Several factors can pull one to the front of the list, such as being a veteran or living in the local area. Those factors are up to each of the housing authorities to decide.
Stucker, of the Housing Alliance of Delaware, said a big issue with the centralized waiting list is that people living on the street now do not usually get priority.
Sandra Countley, chief of staff at the Wilmington Housing Authority, said her organization, which runs public housing and gives out Section 8 vouchers for Delaware’s largest city, does not want to discriminate against people based on where they are currently staying.
“Whoever needs housing, we’re here to provide housing for them,” Countley said.
