Here's how $2.5M from Jeff Bezos’ philanthropic fund will help tackle homelessness in Milwaukee

The Hope House of Milwaukee has been awarded $2.5 million from a fund started by former Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and his ex-wife, MacKenzie Scott.

Hope House Executive Director Wendy Weckler said in August, she was contacted by the Day 1 Families Fund and told Hope House had been chosen by a national panel of experts to apply for the fund. The fund, started in 2018, financially supports organizations that provide shelter and food in the form of annual leadership awards.

“It’s the largest grant we have ever gotten,” she said. “We are super-excited, and we are really happy we’re going to be able to move the needle on family homelessness.”

Hope House was started 35 years ago by local churches on the city’s near south side, evolving to help hundreds of families through the years.

Weckler said the funds from the award will be used to help an additional 45 families through their rapid rehousing Family Bonds Housing Program, and an additional 120 families through the Family Flex Fund. The rapid rehousing program quickly moves families into apartments and provides up to a year of rental assistance and case management, while the Family Flex Fund works with partners United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County and IMPACT, Inc. to help families with case management and financial assistance to prevent homelessness.

“There are a ton of Section 8 (Housing Choice) vouchers available right now to homeless individuals, but they have to come up with their own security deposit, so this can help,” Weckler said. “Sometimes a family has an apartment they can move into, but they don’t have appliances, so we can buy those appliances.”

Other programs offered by the Hope House include eviction prevention, and after-school tutoring and activities.

“This is a transformational gift for Hope House and for those suffering from homelessness in our city,”Hope House Development Director Jim Farrell said in a statement.

Weckler said the agency plans to start using the award in the new year. The award is expected to last over five years.

It is not the first time the Day 1 Families Fund has granted an award to a Milwaukee organization. In 2020, The Cathedral Center received $1.25 million.

This year, the fund distributed more than $120 million — the most it has ever awarded in a single year.

In 2021, Milwaukee County was nationally recognized for reducing homelessness to a count of 17 people. However, some in the homelessness industry say the number is artificially lowered because the count is typically conducted during the bitterly cold month of January, when fewer homeless people stay outside.

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Milwaukee’s Hope House to get $2.5M from ex-Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos