Shelters say they have vacancies for families, women

Tyler Eaker lost his job and considered leaving his wife and two children because he couldn’t bear seeing his family homeless.

“It looked like it was going to be the end of the road for us, and we were going to split up,” Eaker said.

That was six months ago. Since then, the husband and father has moved into the Family Housing Learning Center and says life couldn’t be better.

“The rooms are great. The water works, the air works and everything is clean,” he said. “I wish it were like this at a place you could stay for the rest of your life.”

Eaker, in his early 20s, is a member of one of dozens of families living in homeless shelters around Chattanooga, but local shelter organizers say they still have more than a dozen temporary or transitional housing spaces available to assist mostly homeless families, women and women with children.

Four family spaces or six single spaces are available at Chattanooga’s Room In The Inn, which serves homeless women and women with children.

Women and their children may stay in the shelter for three to nine months, said Laura Faulkner, coordinator at Chattanooga Room In The Inn, on North Highland Park Avenue.

“We want to empower homeless women and children to become self-sufficient,” she said.

Women who come to the inn will have an individualized plan to address educational employment, financial health goals and permanent housing, she said.

Eight beds are available for homeless women at The Next Door. The agency targets women with drug addictions who recently have been released from prison or are on probation.

In addition to helping the women stay clean and sober, The Next Door also teaches lifeskills classes and stress management and helps women get jobs. The goal is for the women eventually to move into permanent housing, said Monica Lester, counselor at the Next Door on 108 Moccasin Bend Road.

Eaker and his family slept on cots at churches through the Interfaith Homeless Network until his wife got a job at Sears. The family then moved into a two-bedroom apartment at the Family Housing Learning Center.

Kathy Long, case manager at the center, helped Eaker get a job as a cook at Sonic Drive-In.

“Now we’ve got money in the bank ... and we’re getting back on our feet,” Eaker said.

Of the 10 units at the Family Housing Learning Center, four are empty. Long said she has been talking with potential applicants and hopes to have at least three of the rooms filled by the end of the month.

The learning center, near the Community Kitchen on East 11th Street, requires residents have a job and have a family that includes children. The center charges families 30 percent of their income for rent, but 75 percent of that money is returned to them when they move out, Long said.

Families may live in the center for up to two years, she said.