New Bailey’s shelter serves most vulnerable members of the community
The nearly completed Bailey’s Shelter and Supportive Housing facility on Seminary Road in Bailey’s Crossroads includes 18 apartments for people transitioning out of homelessness, as well as emergency lodging for 52 men and women.
The community will be invited to an open house at the shelter on Nov. 23.
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| Each supportive housing unit has a kitchenette. |
The new Bailey’s Shelter and Supportive Housing facility will replace the Bailey’s Community Shelter on Moncure Avenue. People staying at the old shelter will be relocated to the new one within the next couple of weeks, says Dean Klein, director of the Fairfax County Office to Prevent and End Homelessness.
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| The outdoor recreation area has a mural about Bailey’s Crossroads. |
The Weissberg Co., which acquired the site of the old shelter in a land swap with Fairfax County, plans to tear down the old shelter by the end of the year to make way for a future redevelopment project.
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| The large dining/activity room can be divided into smaller spaces. |
The new shelter is the first one in Fairfax County to combine beds for the homeless with permanent living space for people working on becoming independent.
Funding for the $15.6 million facility, the largest shelter in the county, came from a human services bond passed by voters in 2016.
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| The shelter has four beds for people with medical needs. |
Four of the 52 beds at the new shelter will be reserved for homeless individuals with acute medical needs. Those beds will serve people discharged from the hospital who have nowhere to go and no family to support them.
“The new Bailey’s Shelter and Supportive Housing is designed to serve our homeless neighbors with dignity by meeting multiple needs at one location,” says Klein. “We hope it serves as an example of how we can all work together to solve our most pressing challenges and make a real difference in our neighbors’ lives.”
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| Rocking chairs on the balcony. |
The shelter is operated by New Hope Housing, a nonprofit that will provide programs and services for residents, such as help with applying for jobs and benefits, life skills workshops, nutrition classes, art therapy, and yoga.
“The new shelter is a great addition to the community,” says Pamela Michell, executive director of New Hope Housing. “This new space will provide greater opportunities to collaborate, to build deeper bonds with the community, and help realize the dreams of our homeless neighbors to have a safe place to call home.”
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| Dean Klein and Pamela Michell in the reception area. |
The supportive housing units have private bathrooms and kitchenettes with a microwave and refrigerator. Individuals who live in those units will pay rent equal to 30 percent of their income. They will be able to stay as long as they want.
Each of those units has been “adopted” by a company, individual, or organization. Klein envisions those units will serve people “who have been isolated for a long time and need a lot of attention, nurturing, and support.”
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| One of several emergency shelter rooms. |
People staying in the emergency shelter space will have a bunk bed, locker, and under-bed storage bin. Clients will not have to leave during the day, but will be encouraged to use that time for working, seeking employment, or accessing county services.
The shelter has a large activity room that will double as a sleeping location for the county’s hypothermia prevention program during the winter months.
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| This space will be used for classes and workshops. |
It also has a medical exam room staffed by a nurse practitioner, space for counseling sessions, a large kitchen and dining area serving three meals a day, a laundry room, an enclosed outdoor recreation area, a balcony, and plenty of office space for staff and volunteers.
According to Klein, the new facility “will bring a sense of energy and optimism to our most vulnerable people.”
This looks homeless shelter looks like a hotel. I'm all for helping the homeless, there are way too many in this predicament and that is sad in a Country as rich as the US. However, this burden is way too often dumped on the local taxpayer with little in return. What Bailey's needs, is a vibrant commercial, residential mixed use development to re-invigorate our local downtown. But our politicians in FFX, don't get it. They figured this out in Arlington, Merrifield, Tysons, Mclean, Vienna, etc. Its only when we have a thriving district can we afford to help improve the lives of the most misfortunate. The way Mason is administered, the tax payer will end up needing a room at the new homeless shelter.
Politicians never make that stuff happen. Developers do. What you mean is that developers eventually got the pols out of the way in (all those places you mentioned).
People deserve some dignity and I am glad to see the house looks the way it does and I hope its residents will find it warm and welcoming.
As for the burden, I propose to turn it around and look at it as a responsibility to other human beings, we can call it also a solidarity. I know this concept is fairly strange in this country that praises individual achievements, which is an interesting dogma that has kept citizens to follow the mainstream narrative for so long. Business development is just that and it never addresses direct needs of the homeless and other people, who often without their fault end up where no one wants to end up.
I encourage you to get closer to the issue, maybe even volunteer in the shelter here and there and get to know its residents. Direct contact often helps close the gap between our personal perception of the situation/people and the reality.
We are all one and we all deserve dignified life. Humanity First!
You mean like Venezuela, where the govt tried to help everyone and now everyone is starving. To share wealth you must generate capital. In Mason we just give it away and do not invigorate our local economy to create more opportunities to help those in need. That is what is more humane.
And that is why I'm voting for Aiken.
This is just one of many reasons I'm voting for Gary Aiken today.
I will vote for anyone that has been branded "Make the Dump desirable again."
Merrifield, Tyson's, McLean, and Vienna are all parts of Fairfax County…
And clearly those communities have had better representation at the table of the BoS than Mason!
"Life liberty and the pursuit of happiness." It's in the Declaration of Independence and are the foundational "inalienable rights" that all of our citizens have. Our fellow citizens are not in need because they want to be in need. Each individual has their own story and that does not matter. What matters is that we care and that we do something about it. Homelessness is immensely complicated with family issues, mental health issues, social issues, etc. that to paint them with a broad brush as "undesirables" is, in my humble opinion, unAmerican. So, kudos to the county for elevating the care for these individuals while at the same time creating a piece of land that is more desirable for developers. I'm not sure what part of Mason that you (anonymous) complainers are looking at: I've lived here for 27 years and it is immensely better and continuously improving.
If you don't like it, get out and improve it. I do!
looks like Penny won…yaw sum coldhearted somebodies…complaining about a park and a homeless shelter…kick rocks Aiken!
Does the blog need to post this idiotic incomprehensible rhetoric. Its pretty sad that these are the kind of people that are now supporting the democrats. Crazies on the left and on the right……the new normal.
I'm very dissappinted Penny got another term, but I'm sure all of our Asian community voted for her, since she has supported and encouraged the Asian businesses in the area!!!
U dummy majority of places white people vote and get there red Lobster color buddy into office and others get less and the few area that another race vote to get what they want and you have a problem with it, you have such a close minded racist mentality
This is a very intelligent run on sentence. The Blog should require that posts have minimum standards for grammatical correctness. This comment is totally incomprehensible. Everyone of us that has an opinion must be a Trumpster and white racist……OMG, go home.