Upper Des Moines Opportunity Housing Program Receiving Additional Funding from HUD

The Upper Des Moines Opportunity Housing Program will be expanding its services thanks to additional funding.

The program, in collaboration with the Iowa Balance of State Continuum of Care, is being awarded over 1.4-million dollars over three years. The money is coming from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The UDMO Housing Program has been effectively and efficiently leveraging Federal, State, and Local funding for the past decade to provide homelessness prevention and intervention services across northwest and north central Iowa. Since 2013, more than two-million dollars in rental assistance payments has been distributed across the UDMO region to assist over 32-hundred individuals from nearly 13-hundred households.

According to Housing Program Director Tanya Thelen, UDMO has assisted 340 individuals from 141 households during the past six months. Over 348-thousand dollars in rental assistance payment has been distributed during that span to prevent families from experiencing homelessness. Thelen says the added 1.4-million in funding consists of a “first of its kind” package of resources to help communities provide housing and supportive services to people in un-sheltered settings, including rural areas.

UDMO will have dedicated Housing Program staff in counties including Clay, as Thelen says Clay is one of the counties that has the greatest demonstrated need in the region.

Upper Des Moines Opportunity is one of 16 community action agencies in Iowa. They serve counties including Buena Vista, Clay, O’Brien, Palo Alto, and Pocahontas.

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