When Taquilla arrived in Atlanta after a long drive from Detroit, her heart sank when she realized that the house she had signed a lease on online would not be ready for her kids to move into. With six kids in her car, she began looking at her options on Google Maps, scrolling through reviews.
The idea of moving her family into an emergency family shelter scared her, but what choice did she have?
“I had just had a newborn baby — she was only a month old — and I had the other kids who need to be in school. I didn’t know where to go or what to do,” she said. “I was heartbroken.”
Just up the street from her soon-to-be home in Forest Park, she found the address for Calvary Refuge, and the staff member on the phone said she and her children could come the very next day.
Despite the scale of housing instability in Clayton County — where more than 2,000 students experiencing homelessness have been identified in the public school system — Calvary Refuge remains the only emergency shelter for families in the southwest metro Atlanta area.
Unlike most shelters, Calvary Refuge does not require coordinated entry, a process that takes time, time that many families in crisis simply don’t have. After just one phone call, families can stay in one of Calvary Refuge’s rooms or bunks for up to 21 days. While there, their case manager will connect them to resources throughout Forest Park through partnerships with workforce development and job readiness programs, housing resources, and food, clothing, and hygiene pantries.
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By calling the family shelter, Taquilla may have made a choice no parent expects to make, but she quickly realized it was the answer to a safe place for her family. That night, her kids enjoyed a hot meal, took baths, and slept in real beds after spending nights upright in a car.
“It opened up my eyes to seeing shelters a lot differently. Coming here, they showed me where to go and how to manage,” she said. “They’ve been nice to everybody that’s come in, but especially people with kids. They love the kids, they treat the babies like they’re family.”
Soon, their house became ready and the family moved from the shelter into their new home. They still keep in touch with their friends from Calvary Refuge. Inspired by the help she received, Taquilla is now working on her own way of serving the community, opening a nursing home in Forest Park.
United Way support, decided by the community
In December, a group of Forest Park residents selected Calvary Refuge to be one of the recipients of a United Way grant through our first community-led grantmaking cohort.
Dr. Bambie Hayes-Brown, a member of the Forest Park cohort, remembers the decision to fund Calvary Refuge. She is the President and CEO of Georgia Advancing Communities Together (Georgia ACT), a statewide affordable housing and community development organization. She’s called Forest Park home for eight years and counting. And she has a personal connection to housing insecurity.
“Because there is a housing crisis in Metro Atlanta, Georgia, and the nation — and as a person with lived experience of homelessness — it was important to me to be able to award Calvary Refuge to serve people who are in the greatest of need,” said Dr. Bambie. “It was great to see all of us come to a consensus, and to go through a building process together with the end goal of wanting what’s best for the City of Forest Park.”
Taquilla may not have personally met Dr. Bambie, but their lives are connected by the same community. In Forest Park, the people making funding decisions are neighbors who understand firsthand how quickly circumstances can change, and why giving back locally matters.
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Housing support to make Forest Park home
Clayton County, where Forest Park is located, faces some of the most severe housing challenges in the state, driven by rising housing costs compared to local incomes. Organizations like Calvary Refuge not only act as a stopgap for families like Taquilla’s to have a safe place to sleep — they help them find stability and resources within the community so they can grow roots.
Currently, the family shelter owns two buildings, one of which was donated by the City of Forest Park, but with their current staff and funding, only one is open. This United Way of Greater Atlanta grant will help them take the next steps toward opening the second building, serving twice as many families in the community each night. That’s twice as many kids with a safe place to sleep, thanks to our collective work: United Way, Calvary Refuge, Forest Park community grantmakers, and donors like you.
When you support United Way, instead of just giving charity to a community, you’re creating opportunities for investment by a community. And with those investments, we’re helping turn crisis into a stable foundation for families right here in the neighborhoods we call home.