“The current system for addressing chronic homelessness in the United States of America is absolutely not working. This is a human issue, that requires a human response” -Alan Graham (Founder & CEO of Mobile Fishes & loaves)
The Community First! Village Project is located in Austin Texas, and it is a neighborhood dedicated to creating affordable sustainable housing for the homeless people that live there! A development of Mobile Loaves & Fishes, this transformative residential program exists to love and serve their neighbors who have been living on the streets, while also empowering the surrounding community into a lifestyle of service with the homeless. Phase 2 of the project to add an additional 24 acres of land, bringing the total to 51 acres of land in the village with more than 500 homes in it!
They accept volunteers to help the village in any way they can. People of varied interests and abilities can volunteer, whether you want to be hands-on serving food during truck runs, prepare meals behind the scenes, or provide other needed assistance. Not only do they prepare and deliver meals to men and women who are living on the streets, they also provide our homeless friends with the dignity that comes with handshake, a hug or a friendly smile.
Click here to visit the Community First! Village website!
“We’re trained to take advantage of the opportunities that a site gives us like capturing prevailing breezes, capturing natural light, you know using local materials all those things are really old fashioned but tried and true ways to be sustainable.” -Heather H Mckinney (Founder of Mckinney York Architects)
I got to interview Ms. Heather H Mckinney! She is the founder of Mckinney York Architects and started her firm in 1984. As an architecture design studio located in Austin Texas, Mckinney York Architects believes in the power of people and places to enrich lives. Their goal is to “connect people to each other and the world around them by creating architecture that engages, inspires, and belongs.” Their team focuses on using sustainable practices in all their architecture designs to create a warm, welcoming, safe environment for all their clients.
Right now they are partnering with Community First to help them with the designs of the houses.
“we’ve done 2 designs for them, the first design was really a one off design, it was well crafted and the second design was designed so that it could be duplicated and actually built by fairly non skilled labor like for example volunteers from your church could come and build a house with our drawings, they order in all the materials and it’s almost like a kit you can put together. So there were some different parameters for each of those 2 houses in terms of how easily they can be made. So now I think we have our house, the second house has been replicated several times already, and there will probably be 5 or 6 of those on the site as they move along.” – Heather H Mckinney