|
 Human
Service Hot File
Life House
Rachel Kincade, Executive
Director
102 West First St.
Duluth, MN 55802
Phone: 218-722-7431 Fax: 218-722-7048
rkincade@computerpro.com
Mission
Life House, Inc. serves low-income, high-risk, and
homeless youth, ages 14-21, by assuring access to housing,
education and employment opportunities.
Programs,
and populations served
Life House operates several programs for youth in
the Duluth area. One
of these services is transitional housing, which includes
Harbor House for young women and Proctor House for young men.
Youth are able to stay in these facilities for up to
two years. In
order to be housed in the program, the youth must be working
towards completing their high school education.
Once they have achieved this goal, they must be working
a minimum of 20 hours a week.
They are required to contribute 25% of their income;
however, if they have no income when they enter the program,
there is no fee pending an arrangement through MFIP, GA, or
unemployment. These youth also assist in developing individual
goal sheets, which may include things like sobriety support,
mental health treatment, or parenting classes.
In addition to the transitional
housing units, Life House operates a drop-in center at 1st
Ave. W. and 1st St., which is open from 9 a.m.
until 9 p.m., Monday through Friday.
The youth center serves between 700-900 youth a year.
Currently, the drop-in center has personal care
products, food, free video games and pool available.
For young women in the teen parent program, free
formula, baby clothes, diapers, etc. are available.
Between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. at
the drop-in shelter, two housing programs are available.
The first is the Family Homelessness Prevention and
Assistance Program, which works with youth who are
transitioning out of the housing program or other programs.
Life House often receives referrals from Women’s
Transitional Housing and the Women’s Shelter.
The second program is the Landlord/Tenant Liaison
Program. This
program works with homeless youth, those living in a shelter,
or those facing an eviction.
Life House works closely with landlords in the
community to get kids into their own apartments, on Section 8,
or into public housing.
Current
Issues: Fostering
Relationships
“When kids come here,
a lot of times it is a trust issue.
They will first just scope it out to see ‘what’s
going on here.’ And
after you’ve seen a kid for two or three months and maybe
they’ve played dice with the foster grandparents there, just
kind of hung out and discovered what the place has to offer,
then they will tell you that there is some abuse going on at
home, or they have dropped out of school.”
—Kim Hauge, Program Coordinator, Life House
Homeless Youth
“They go underground oftentimes, or they stay with
friends. I know
the elevators they sleep in, and the stairwells.
They have told me stories where they go to see if cars
are unlocked and get in the back seat and sleep, or not really
sleep but just lay there.
So we have two other programs and there will be six
beds added. And
we have the different funding sources, one that works strictly
with HUD definition homeless.
Then we have Loaves and Fishes, and they will pull out
a couch for us in extreme circumstances even when they are
full, and they are generally full. So getting the beds that we will have is really exciting for
the case managers.”
—Rachel Kincade, Executive Director, Life House
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