Steady Ground Family Housing Stabilization Program

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Executive Summary

Steady Ground Family Housing Stabilization Program is a nonprofit in Washington that helps families with children move quickly out of homelessness and stay housed. We pay deposits and short-term rent directly to landlords, recruit landlords who will say yes, and assign a case manager for about six months who connects each family with child care, jobs, benefits and school help.

Families with children are among the fastest-growing groups without a stable home. Children who lose their housing fall behind in school and in health, and parents lose jobs while looking for a place to live. A deposit, a landlord who says yes and a steady guide can end that.

With this grant we will serve about 50 families in Year 1 from 1 office. We never give cash to families and we do not promise that every family will keep its housing. We promise careful use of every dollar, respect for every family and a guide who stays.

Our Year 1 budget is about $226,500, growing to about $398,000 by Year 5 as we add sites, coaches and participants. Each year's budget is planned to balance, with a small surplus each year. We have 4 staff in Year 1 (an Executive Director, a case manager and a part-time landlord liaison) and 7 by Year 5.

We are asking the Evergreen Family Housing Foundation for $70,000 for the Housing Case Manager and move-in and rent assistance. Our other income and startup support cover the rest. These numbers are estimates based on the assumptions listed at the end of this proposal, and we do not promise any result beyond what we describe.

Company Description

Steady Ground Family Housing Stabilization Program is a nonprofit organization in Washington. We are a registered charity with a volunteer board of directors, a written conflict-of-interest policy and a yearly budget the board reviews.

Our mission. Every child should have a stable home, and every family that loses one should have a fast, fair way back.

What we do.
- Help families with children move quickly out of shelter, cars or doubled-up housing into leased apartments.
- Pay move-in costs and short-term rent directly to landlords.
- Assign each family a housing case manager for about six months.
- Recruit and support landlords with a single point of contact and a damage and rent-guarantee fund.
- Connect families with child care, job help, benefits and school enrollment.
- Follow every family for twelve months after assistance ends.

Our values. Respect for every participant, honesty with families and partners, safety first and a place for everyone who wants to belong.

What we do not do. We never give cash to families. Payments go directly to landlords and vendors. We do not give legal advice and refer families to legal aid. We do not provide emergency shelter. We do not promise that every family will keep its housing. We follow the rules of our partner sites and our insurer.

How we got here. A group of social workers, teachers and faith volunteers began helping families in a school district find apartments after their children told teachers they were sleeping in cars. The demand grew every month. We kept simple records of who we helped and who stayed housed. This proposal asks for support to move from a small volunteer effort to a steady program with paid, trained staff and the materials to match.

Problem & Opportunity

Families with children are among the fastest-growing groups of people without a stable home, and children who lose their housing fall behind in school and in health.

Cost. A move-in costs first month's rent, a deposit and fees, which can total several thousand dollars that a family in crisis does not have.

Access. Landlords often screen out families with past evictions, low credit or no rental history, and housing lists have long waits.

Safety and trust. Landlords and funders want a reliable partner who pays on time, answers calls and helps solve problems.

Missed benefits. Children without stable housing may change schools several times a year, and parents may lose jobs while looking for a place to live.

What we hear.
- A teacher says three students in her class sleep in a car.
- A mother says she has a job and cannot find a landlord who will rent to her.
- A landlord says he would rent to more families if someone stood behind them.
- A school social worker says a stable address changes everything for a child.

We do not claim that a program can solve every challenge. We believe that a deposit, a landlord who says yes and a steady guide can end a family's time without a home.

Products & Services

Steady Ground Family Housing Stabilization Program gives families with children who have lost or are about to lose their housing a safe, welcoming place to move into stable housing and stay there.

How the program works.
1. Referral. Schools, shelters, 211 and agencies refer families to a single phone line.
2. Assessment. A case manager meets the family, confirms their situation and writes a housing plan with them.
3. Search. A landlord liaison finds and negotiates units that fit the family's budget and location.
4. Move-in. We pay the deposit, first month's rent and fees directly to the landlord.
5. Short-term rent. We pay a declining share of rent for up to six months while the family builds income.
6. Support. The case manager connects the family with child care, jobs, benefits and school help.
7. Follow-up. We check in monthly for the first six months and at twelve months.

What a typical session looks like. Participants arrive and check in with a staff member, settle in together, work on the day's activity in small groups and finish with a short talk about what went well. Staff praise effort, correct mistakes kindly and make sure no one is left out.

Staff. Our case managers and housing specialists are trained in housing stabilization, pass a background check, complete our training and are paid for their time.

Access and fairness. Programs are free. Services are free. We welcome every family that qualifies regardless of immigration status where the law allows, and we offer services in English and Spanish.

Market Analysis

Who we serve. Families with children who are homeless or at imminent risk of homelessness in our county. Eligibility is based on housing status, income guidelines our board sets and referral, and no family is turned away without a referral to other help.

How we estimate need. We cannot count every young person who could benefit, so we plan from what we can see. In our volunteer effort we received more requests than we could handle and kept a waiting list. School district staff told us that many more families need help than we can serve. For Year 1 we plan to serve about 50 participants at 1 offices. By Year 5, with more staff and sites, we plan to serve about 130.

Where participants come from.
- School district staff and school social workers.
- Shelters, 211 and county agencies.
- Churches and food pantries.
- Families who tell a friend.

Who else benefits. Children gain stable schools. Landlords gain reliable tenants. The community avoids the high cost of shelter and emergency care.

What the numbers mean. Every number here is a child with a key to a new home. We keep our early counts modest and honest so we can do the work well.

Competitive Landscape

What young people can find today, and how we are different.

1. Emergency shelters. Essential, with limited space and time. We help families move on.

2. Public housing and vouchers. Valuable and have waits of years. We offer fast, short-term help.

3. Rapid rehousing programs. Strong models with limited funding. We add capacity.

4. Churches and charities. Generous with one-time help. We add ongoing case management.

5. Legal aid. Defends evictions and does not pay housing costs. We coordinate.

What makes us different.
- Fast move-in help paid directly to landlords.
- A case manager for every family.
- A landlord liaison and a guarantee fund.
- Support for children's school and child care needs.
- Follow-up for twelve months.

Why this gap matters. Existing programs do good work, and most serve people who can already pay or who live close to them. The people we serve are the ones left over: they live in the wrong neighborhood, have the wrong schedule or have no one to ask. We are built to reach them.

We have spoken with school district staff, shelters, landlords and other housing programs to make sure we are filling a gap and not duplicating services. Their letters of support are in the attachments.

Marketing & Sales Strategy

How young people and partners will find us.

Reaching young people.
- Schools. We will give school social workers a short referral form and a named contact.
- Shelters and 211. We will share our phone line and referral steps.
- Landlords. We will meet property managers and offer a point of contact.
- Churches and pantries. We will leave flyers and talk with leaders.
- Word of mouth. Families tell friends.
- A simple website and a phone line with a text option.

Reaching staff and sponsors.
- Recruit case managers and housing specialists through social work programs, housing agencies and faith groups.
- Offer an orientation, a background check and training in safety, privacy and respectful practice.
- Give partners a short report each quarter with counts of participants and what they said.

How we decide who joins. We use a simple sign-up form and enroll participants in the order received, with priority for those with the greatest need and for people new to the program. We keep a waiting list when the program is full.

What we watch. Sign-ups, attendance, families housed, landlords recruited and how many participants return for a second season.

Operations Plan

How the program will be carried out.

Timeline for Year 1:
- Months 1 and 2 (July and August): Hire the staff, buy equipment and materials, finalize the waiver, consent form and privacy policy with our attorney and sign site agreements.
- Month 3 (September): Open referrals and begin intake.
- Months 4 to 10: Assess families, place them in housing, pay assistance directly and follow every family.
- Months 11 and 12: Survey families and landlords, report to funders and plan Year 2.

Space. We work from a small donated office and meet families in public places and at their new homes.

Safety and privacy.
- Assistance is limited by written policy, reviewed by two people and paid only to landlords and vendors.
- Every staff member and volunteer passes a background check and completes safety training.
- Staff work in pairs or in view of others whenever participants are minors or in a vulnerable situation.
- We keep an emergency plan at every site, and participants complete an emergency contact form.
- We keep records private, share them only with a participant's permission or as the law requires and follow a written policy.

Equipment. We buy about $7,000 of equipment once at the start: laptops and a secure case management system ($3,000), printer, scanner and locking file storage ($1,500), office furnishings and a children's corner for client meetings ($2,500). Later years replace or add a few items.

Staffing. In Year 1 I serve as Executive Director. The Housing Case Manager, paid $46,000 a year, works with each family. A part-time landlord liaison, paid $26,000, builds relationships with property owners. We add a case manager in Year 2, a third in Year 4 and a fourth in Year 5.

Management & Organization

Teresa Nakamura, Executive Director. I lead the organization, report to the board and am responsible for budgets, partnerships and reporting. I came to this work as a school social worker who watched children come to class from cars. I will complete the training we require of our case managers so I understand the program from the inside. (Replace this paragraph with your own background.)

Staff. The housing case managers work with each family, and a part-time landlord liaison builds relationships with property owners. Each passes a background check. These positions are part of our grant request.

Board of directors. Our volunteer board includes a school social worker, a property manager, a parent who has been homeless, a banker who serves as treasurer, an attorney and a pastor. The board meets every other month, approves our budget and reviews our safety plan. No board member is paid, and members with a conflict of interest step out of related decisions.

Advisory partners. A school district homeless liaison, a county housing staff member and a legal aid attorney give guidance twice a year.

Staffing and pay in this plan: Executive Director, paid $54,000 a year; housing Case Manager, paid $46,000 a year; landlord Liaison (part-time), paid $26,000 a year.

Milestones Narrative

Our goals, how we will measure them and when we plan to reach them.

Year 1 outcomes (July 2027 through June 2028):
- Serve about 50 participants at 1 offices.
- Run at least two full seasons and a summer session.
- Have at least 85 percent of participants attend most sessions.
- Have at least 80 percent of participants return for a second season.
- Receive positive feedback from at least 90 percent of families who answer our short survey.

What we count and how.
- Participants enrolled, sessions and games attended, from our records.
- Skills learned and goals met, from the coach's checklist.
- Equipment issued and returned, from our log.
- Participant and family feedback, from a short, confidential form.
We report what we find, including what did not work, and use it to improve.

Growth over five years.
- Year 2: About 70 participants at 1 offices.
- Year 3: About 90 participants at 2 offices.
- Year 4: About 110 participants at 2 offices.
- Year 5: About 130 participants at 3 offices.

Learning along the way. At the end of each quarter, the director and the board review the numbers and decide whether we are on track. If we are behind, we will adjust our outreach, our sites or our schedule before asking for more money.

After the grant. By Year 5, grants make up about 57 percent of our budget, down from about 60 percent in Year 1, as partners and donors give more. We will keep building those relationships every year.

Funding Request

What we are asking for, and how the money will be used. Our request: $70,000 from the Evergreen Family Housing Foundation for the Housing Case Manager and move-in and rent assistance, for July 2027 through June 2028.

The request is spread across these budget lines:
- Personnel: Housing Case Manager salary, $46,000.
- Other: Move-in and short-term rent assistance paid directly to landlords, $24,000.

Other money in the program. This request is about 51% of our Year 1 grant income. Other grants and the income lines below pay for everything it does not cover.

Year 1 budget: about $226,500, planned to balance with a small surplus (about $9,100 after the yearly wear on equipment). Year 1 money coming in: Grant Revenue $136,500; county Homeless Housing Funding $60,000; corporate and Faith Partners $20,000; individual Donors $10,000. Year 1 costs: executive Director $54,000; housing Case Manager $46,000; landlord Liaison (part-time) $26,000; move-In and Rent Assistance about $60,000; child Care and Transportation Support about $8,000; landlord Incentive and Guarantee Fund about $6,000; staff Training about $3,000; evaluation about $3,000; administration and Insurance about $10,000; about $3,400 a year for the wear on equipment.

One-time startup costs. Startup costs of $16,000 are paid once from startup money, not from the yearly budget: $3,000 for laptops and a secure case management system; $1,500 for printer, scanner and locking file storage; $2,500 for office furnishings and a children's corner for client meetings; $2,500 for attorney review of the family agreement, payment policy and privacy policy; $1,800 for banners, flyers and a simple website; $1,700 for background checks and case manager training; $3,000 for first insurance payment.

How we got our startup number. The Funding Need Calculator in this plan adds the startup costs ($16,000), the cash the program uses before it balances (about $0) and a cash cushion of about $54,000, which is about three months of Year 1 costs. In all, that comes to $70,000. We start with $8,000 from our founding board and $64,000 in startup support from a community foundation and a faith coalition, $72,000 in all, which covers that amount with room to spare.

The next five years. Our budget grows from about $226,500 in Year 1 to about $398,000 in Year 5. Grants are planned at $136,500, $171,000, $157,500, $192,500 and $228,000 in Years 1 to 5. Other income grows: county Homeless Housing Funding from $60,000 to $100,000; corporate and Faith Partners from $20,000 to $44,000; individual Donors from $10,000 to $26,000. Our surplus is planned at about $9,100 in Year 1, about $12,300 in Year 2, about $13,000 in Year 3, about $16,000 in Year 4 and about $19,100 in Year 5. We grow from 1 offices to 3 by Year 5, adding a part-time coach for each new site.

Savings. We plan to keep several months of costs in savings. The lowest year-end balance in the plan is about $66,400, at the end of Year 1. Some grant payments and partner payments arrive after we bill, so we plan for about $9,060 owed to us at the end of Year 1.

Cost per family. In Year 1, our total costs are about $4,348 per family served, which includes setting up the program. By Year 5, with more family served and a trained team in place, that falls to about $2,914 per family.

After the grant. County homeless housing funding, corporate sponsors and individual donors grow every year, so grants become a smaller share of our budget. Participants and families share their stories, and businesses can sponsor a team or a season by name. We will look for partnerships with schools and the city that want a safe, free housing option for every child.

Risks and how we will handle them:
- An injury. Certified coaches, proper equipment, groups matched by age and skill, a written emergency plan and insurance.
- A site is no longer available. We keep agreements with more than one site and a plan for bad weather.
- A coach leaves. We keep a list of trained backup coaches and share lesson plans.
- Low attendance. We adjust sites, times and rides based on family feedback.
- A privacy problem. We follow a written policy, use secure systems and train every staff member and volunteer.
- A grant ends. We keep savings and grow partner and donor support each year.

If you are just starting. A new organization can begin before it has its own 501(c)(3) status through a fiscal sponsor: an established nonprofit that receives grants for you and passes them to your program, usually for a fee (commonly around 5% to 10% of the grant, sometimes more; ask before you agree). Another way is to start smaller: one neighborhood, a handful of familys and a small team, tracked carefully. Strong results from a small start make larger grants easier to win.

Appendix Notes

Documents to attach with this proposal:

- Your IRS 501(c)(3) determination letter, or your fiscal sponsor agreement.
- Your most recent financial statements and your current year budget.
- A list of your board members and what each one does.
- Signed letters of support from partner schools, agencies and sites.
- Your site agreements and your insurance certificate.
- Your consent, waiver and privacy policy.
- Your safety plan and background check policy.
- Your program outline and schedule.
- Quotes for equipment and materials.
- Resumes for your Executive Director and key staff.
If you don't have any of this yet, no worries - let's continue.

The assumptions behind our numbers (change them in the Financials section to match your own):
- Grant Revenue: $136,500 in Year 1, growing to $228,000 in Year 5.
- County Homeless Housing Funding: $60,000 in Year 1, growing to $100,000 in Year 5.
- Corporate and Faith Partners: $20,000 in Year 1, growing to $44,000 in Year 5.
- Individual Donors: $10,000 in Year 1, growing to $26,000 in Year 5.
- Pay (a full year, per person, including payroll taxes and workers' compensation): executive Director $54,000; housing Case Manager $46,000; landlord Liaison (part-time) $26,000.
- Other yearly costs in Year 1: move-In and Rent Assistance $60,000; child Care and Transportation Support $8,000; landlord Incentive and Guarantee Fund $6,000; staff Training $3,000; evaluation $3,000; administration and Insurance $10,000. These grow between 4% and 6% a year.
- Equipment: $7,000 at the start, then $2,000 to $3,000 a year.
- Startup costs: $16,000, paid once from $72,000 in startup money.
- Participants served: about 50 in Year 1, growing to about 130 in Year 5. Sites: 1 in Year 1, growing to 3 by Year 5. Families are accepted year-round and followed for twelve months.
- About 4% of each year's income is still owed to us at year end.
- Tax: none, as a nonprofit.
- Every dollar amount is an estimate. Replace them with your own quotes and real budget.

Startup Costs