photo by: Mike Yoder

The Lawrence Community Shelter, 3655 E. 25th St., is pictured in this file photo from 2015.

The Lawrence Community Shelter has requested more than $2 million in federal pandemic aid to expand its capacity and support other functions at the homeless shelter.

The shelter submitted a letter of interest to Douglas County for American Rescue Plan Act funding for $2.165 million to support five functions at the shelter. Specifically, the shelter requested funding to support expansion of its emergency shelter capacity, its rapid rehousing efforts, vouchers to keep people housed, full use of its tiny home village, and COVID-19 mitigation measures.

The shelter has been operating at about a third of its capacity for much of the past few years. The shelter is permitted to serve 125 people most of the time and 140 people during the winter, and it originally reduced its capacity to 65 people in August 2019 amid budget issues and changes to its staffing model. It further reduced the number of people housed at its building in eastern Lawrence to a maximum of 40 during the COVID-19 pandemic so that it could space out guests in its dormitories and have room to quarantine guests as necessary.

The shelter completed a pilot program for its new tiny home village for families, Monarch Village, at the end of December, but thereafter suspended the program and again stopped accepting families. A shelter leader said in January that the decision to put the program on hold was based on a need to add more staff to adequately supervise the program and to use the tiny homes for COVID-19 isolation purposes.

The shelter’s letter of interest includes requests for the following five functions:

• $825,000 to expand the shelter’s emergency shelter capacity over a period of three years. The request calls for $275,000 per year to add 15 to 20 beds annually over the three-year period, or a total of 45 to 60 additional beds.

• $600,000 to support the shelter’s rapid rehousing program over a period of three years. The request calls for $200,000 per year to support care coordination and transitional support.

•$375,000 to support efforts to help keep people housed over a period of three years. The request calls for $125,000 per year to enhance voucher programs, utility assistance and coordination with area agencies.

• $240,000 to support full use of the shelter’s tiny home village over a period of three years. The request calls for $80,000 per year to implement recommendations from the pilot program for increased supervision and “repurposing as needed,” as well as funding to explore additional tiny homes.

•$125,000 for additional costs related to COVID-19, including testing, mitigation, isolation and sanitation.

In response to questions on the letter of interest form, the shelter states the efforts will be sustainable once the federal funds have been exhausted.

The shelter’s letter of interest for ARPA funds is among $77 million in requests submitted to the county. The county will receive $23.7 million in ARPA funding over the next two years, about $21.1 million of which is still available. Agencies will have to submit formal proposals to the county by June, and the County Commission has set June 15 and 22 as tentative dates to consider the proposals.

On Tuesday, the Lawrence City Commission delayed approving the city’s $290,000 annual allocation for the shelter, asking first for a more detailed funding agreement. Commissioners agreed that they wanted to delay approval so the agreement could be amended to specify that city funding should go specifically to support emergency sheltering. The funding agreement will come back to the commission for consideration next month.