Developers of a $20 million housing project for low-income, senior and disable veterans will break ground in Hobart on Aug. 27.
Representatives from the Chicago-based A Safe Haven Foundation, a group dedicated to helping the homeless, have scheduled a groundbreaking at the project site at 7930 Iowa St. at 10 a.m. The U.S. Housing and Urban Development and U.S. Veterans Administration 75-unit apartment project will be called The Rauner Family Veteran Apartments by A Safe Haven Foundation and is scheduled to open by the spring.
In addition to more than $20 million in Federal HUD/VA rental housing tax credits, bond volume and other financing secured from the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority, former Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner and his wife, Diana, gifted $1 million to A Safe Haven Foundation to support the project.
The apartments will be available to low-income, senior and disabled military veterans who are referred to A Safe Haven by the local US Veteran Administration offices. Onsite services will include supportive housing, individualized case management, and peer support services.
“Since 1994, A Safe Haven’s mission has always been to set new paradigms and standards of care to address and solve the root causes of poverty and homelessness, especially on behalf of our veterans,” said Neli Vazquez Rowland, ASHF president and co-founder. “As a U.S. Army military veteran co-founded organization, projects like this one are very important as it helps us raise the bar and expand our transitional, supportive and permanent housing solutions (and) we are very proud to help bring our award-winning model and to build beautiful places to live for our nation’s heroes in the state of Indiana.”
A Safe Haven Foundation has worked on the project with KMA Companies and the city of Hobart for nearly three years.
The apartments will be furnished and also will offer flexible meeting space/community room, exercise room, laundry room, bike storage and a beautifully, professionally landscaped outdoor patio courtyard. The walkway to the main entrance will feature a Bronze Star monument to Michael Rowland, a decorated Korean War veteran and father of A Safe Haven co-founder and U.S. Army veteran Brian Rowland.
