Now 67, DeNise remembers her life decades ago, when she was married, prosperous, and content. “I know what it’s like not to want,” she said. That was before the divorce, the ravages of alcoholism that took hold after her father died, her serious heart disease, her second husband’s struggles with mental wellness, and their eventual homelessness.

DeNise and Tony had lived for about five years in an apartment in a large, older house, trading her administrative work and his handyman services for rent. But the downstairs landlord’s circumstances changed, and they had to leave, unable to afford what would have been $2,500 each month for rent. “He was a painter,” she said about Tony, “but he had a hip problem,” and could no longer do heavy physical labor. She had worked in finance and did administrative work, and sometimes people’s income tax returns. Their car broke down, and they couldn’t afford repairs or a replacement. Each of them has a few family members, DeNise said, but they are largely estranged. Though it all, she said, she kept calling Grassroots and Bridges looking for help.

Last winter, her husband spent his days in an unheated garage and sometimes slept in their car at night. Later, they lived for a couple of months in an extended-stay hotel, and finally in Grassroots, Howard County’s homeless shelter. She hopes that the downward spiral is over now that Bridges to Housing Stability, a Howard County nonprofit that fights homelessness, has found them a comfortable one-bedroom apartment near Columbia. Bridges paid the first month’s rent and security deposit, found them furniture through Home of Our Own, another nonprofit, and donated kitchen and cleaning supplies, towels, sheets, and toiletries. DeNise and her husband, Tony, 57, pay 30% of their monthly Social Security income as rent.

“She’s very excited,” Bridges Housing Advocate Ginger Ernest said about DeNise. “She was very, very, very afraid to make that step (out of the shelter),” fearful that something would go wrong and they’d be back on the street again. Once the move happened in mid-October, “I got e-mails all the time expressing gratitude,” Ernest said. DeNise was especially happy she could keep her cat. “She was calling every day,” about the cat.

DeNise’s health challenges are numerous. She has constant pain and trouble breathing, she said, and was hospitalized repeatedly. At one point, she thought she might die before finding a decent place to live. “I was pretty sick,” she said. Ginger Ernest said that once they were living in Grassroots, it took about two months, using Bridges’ Rapid Rehousing program to find a place they could move into. She added that she is still looking for a more permanent place for the couple. Along the way, she said they also received professional counseling to help with the stress and frustration.

“Now that we have a home I can relax a little bit,” DeNise said. “I feel singled out, in a good way,” she added. Living in the shelter, she saw people with many children who had even bigger problems than she and Tony faced. That helped to put their situation in perspective, she said. Sometimes, DeNise recalled, she nearly gave up, but with the help they’ve received, she realized “you’ve just got to do it,” keep going and not stop.

“I have to have some hope,” she said, adding that as she looks around their new place, “I just can’t believe we got this place.”

P.R., a 65-year-old single mother of one, has shown incredible resilience and determination throughout her journey with Bridges to Housing Stability. After experiencing housing instability, she was connected to Grassroots in 2013, where she received temporary motel housing. By March 2013, she was referred to the Housing Stability Subsidy Program (HSSP) for long-term support.

P.R. faced multiple challenges, including PTSD, financial hardship, and a lack of affordable housing. With the support of her Housing Advocate, she developed a personalized Housing Stability Plan. She received assistance with budgeting, employment resources, and strategies to navigate her mental health needs and legal concerns.

As part of her financial recovery, her advocate referred her to financial literacy programs such as Making Change and Tower Federal Credit Union to improve her savings habits and strengthen her banking practices. Despite her efforts, P.R. struggled to keep up with rent due to inconsistent income and ongoing financial pressure. However, with her advocate’s help, she was connected to multiple community-based rental assistance programs. These critical resources allowed her to catch up on rent, avoid eviction, and maintain stable housing, turning a major obstacle into a turning point. Recently, P.R. secured full-time employment, a significant step toward long-term stability. She has also improved communication with her landlord, strengthened her budgeting skills, and continues to follow through on her financial responsibilities.

Her 26-year-old son, who has been engaged with Bridges since March 2013, has also made meaningful strides. Earlier this year, the two attended a Tenant Success Program (TSP) event together for the first time, where they were deeply encouraged by the wealth of resources available. At the event, her son was particularly inspired by a conversation with the Employment Specialist, who emphasized the importance of professionalism and posture during job interviews. That message sparked newfound motivation and confidence in him.

Following the event, he received individualized support to update his resume, renew his driver’s license, and apply for jobs. Thanks to this guidance, he is now gainfully employed and takes pride in contributing to household expenses. Most recently, P.R. and her son were gifted a donated vehicle through the NABC Recycled Rides program after three months of anticipation. This generous gift has brought them greater independence and mobility, removing a major barrier in their journey toward self-sufficiency.

P.R. continues to work closely with her Housing Advocate and remains committed to her goals. Her progress is a powerful testament to the impact of personalized support, community partnerships, and her own perseverance. Her family’s story shows how Bridges’ services and programs like the Tenant Success Program offer real opportunities for families to move forward and build a brighter future.

Sometimes, the simplest thing can seem luxurious, like having a bedroom with a door that can close after spending years living in motels with a family of six. Cierra, 32, lived that existence with her husband Chris and their four children, but now, thanks to help from Howard County’s homelessness-fighting nonprofit Bridges to Housing Stability and a host of others, the family has a three-bedroom apartment in Columbia and a fresh start in life. “I don’t know where we would be without help,” Cierra said.

Jasmine Franklin, who helps run Bridges’ Family Home Start Program, said the group provided the security deposit and first month’s rent, and provided a welcome basket of household items to get the family back on track. “They have a very interesting story,” Franklin said, referring to their very long struggle with a variety of tough problems. The program has served over 100 families since its founding in 2024, she added, and applicants must provide proof of income and documents from Howard County schools showing their homeless status. In Cierra’s case, the circumstances were complicated with four children, including one with chronic medical problems. That meant that Cierra had to be a full-time mother, while Chris worked on finding a better-paying job.

The family’s troubles began with a broken water pipe on the second floor of their rented townhouse six years ago, Cierra said. The first floor was flooded, but they had renters’ insurance, and the landlord made repairs and things seemed okay. But Cierra said the repairs were shoddy and two months later, just as she was about to give birth to her youngest, it happened again, ruining their new furniture. They asked to move to another unit, but the landlord refused, she said, and they had to get out. Then Chris lost his job of 15 years, and she experienced a very difficult birth, with her new son unable to breathe at first and herself bleeding badly. “We died, twice,” she said, and the baby stopped breathing repeatedly, ending up on oxygen for a year.

Even before these calamities, “we were already struggling,” financially, she said, living paycheck to paycheck. They got temporary help from the Community Action Council and ended up in a double room at the old Brown’s Motel on U.S. 40 in Ellicott City. Their oldest child went to live temporarily with a grandfather, but the months rolled by and he came back to rejoin the family as it became clear that while they had enough income to stay at the motel, they didn’t have enough to get a permanent home.

Finally, Chris got a better job, and with the kids in school, Cierra also found work. Then the owner of Brown’s made a deal to sell the place to a developer, and the family had to move again, this time to an extended stay motel for about six months until they were finally able to move into the apartment they found in May. But they endured and finally moved forward, she said.

“Our family is so close-knit,” Cierra said, and others living at Brown’s were so kind and supportive. “We literally made family there.” Even so, sometimes, Cierra said, it all just felt like too much. One time, she recalled “we just looked at each other and just burst into tears. It seemed like every time we’d take two steps forward, something would push us ten steps back.”  Enduring all the stress was tough, she said. “We were so defeated. We have been working our butts off.”

Despite all that, there were high points along the way too. Their worker at Grassroots, Howard County’s main homeless shelter, was very kind and helpful, “an absolute godsend,” Ceirra said. Even County Councilwoman Liz Walsh, who represents Ellicott City, got involved and personally helped, she said, giving her an occasional ride and passing along shoes for her kids.

In the end, it all paid off. “She was so happy and thankful,” Franklin said, and Chris is a “really great dad and husband.” Her kids did have to change schools when they moved to Columbia, but Cierra said her daughters said they didn’t mind that because they now have their own bedrooms.

“We love it. We absolutely love it,” she said about the new place. Sometimes, she said, “I can’t believe it’s ours.”

Thanks to her own persistence and strategic, repeated help from Bridges to Housing Stability, Grace and her family are living in a safe, affordable Columbia townhouse. Better yet, her son is in college on a scholarship, her daughter didn’t have to change schools, and she is now working, promoting her new home design venture, and studying for an advanced nursing degree.

Grace’s long journey began a decade ago, when she struggled to establish herself in the U.S. after her marriage broke up, leaving her alone and pregnant. Her ex-husband, she said, has never seen his son in person or contributed to his support. She had lived in a variety of Howard County apartments and had a variety of jobs over the years, but repeated misfortunes – a job loss, a problem with a lease, a cancer scare, and the deaths of her mother and sister in the same year -- temporarily derailed her life, forcing her to put her belongings in storage and scramble for new lodgings. She ended up staying temporarily in motels.

Bridges has several times helped her regain stability. A Bridges housing advocate has worked with Grace for the past year.

Back in 2014, she was one month late on her rent and was evicted, with her belongings out on the street, she recalled. Bridges helped move her stuff into storage, while she camped with a friend for a week and found a new place. Two years later, pregnant with her daughter, medical complications forced her out of work, prompting another storage rental and three months in a motel. Then her fiancée got her an apartment and was paying the rent, though he wasn’t living there, and that eventually led to another eviction, even as she prepared to give birth, she said.

When her daughter was born, she applied for a new place in her own name and got one -- a two-bedroom apartment in Columbia. A close friend helped her, she recounted. “Bridges helped every month,” she said, and she found a new government job a few months later. Meanwhile, her son was attending a local private school on scholarship. Then in 2019, her younger sister died, followed months later by her mother’s death.

“I was crying. My parents supported me (emotionally).”  Grace feels her optimistic personality is key to her survival. “That saved me,” she said.

Now 44, her original dream of becoming a doctor has yielded to life’s fortunes, but she is determined to be successful. “Success is the best revenge,” she said. Grace remained safe during the pandemic. But in 2022, she had a cancer scare that fortunately turned out to be false, and in 2023 she moved to a larger, nicer apartment, but one she eventually realized she could not afford for the long term. By late 2023, she was back at an extended stay motel.

Most recently, Bridges helped get her into a subsidized townhouse, providing a security deposit, first month’s rent, and a monthly subsidy which will decline over a year’s time. Grace “does love interior decorations,” her Advocate said, and is “extremely optimistic,” which helps motivate her. When she has a goal, “she’ll find a way.”

For her part, Grace is very appreciative. Without Bridges, and people like her Advocate, she knows she would have been “out on the street.”

“[Bridges staff members] are nice people,” she said. “They are very passionate about what they do. I am praying to God that one day, I can give back.”

After years of driving trucks and delivering large appliances, Gary's knees gave out. Burdened with pain and debts, he first lost his job, then his apartment, and found himself homeless, living along U.S. 1 in Howard County. “I was on the street, sleeping in the cold,” he recalled, adding that it went on for four long years. Sometimes, he said, if the weather was very cold or stormy, he’d use some of his Social Security money to rent a motel room for a night or two. He also sometimes used the county’s Day Resource Center on Guilford Road to shower or wash his clothes. “I couldn’t work no more, because of my knees,” he said. Finally, he got into the Grassroots County’s homeless shelter, and things began to improve. 

Now 66, he has a one-bedroom apartment in Columbia, thanks to Bridges to Housing Stability, the non-profit that also found him some furniture and kitchen supplies. He gets by on less than $700 a month, he said, due to the child support he’s still catching up on for his youngest child, now 18. Bridges helped make that possible by helping him get a housing voucher, which limits his rent to an affordable amount based on his income. 

Gary is among a number of Bridges clients who have been referred from Grassroots. Once there, he said, he used Medicaid, the federal/state health insurance for the poor, to get surgery on both knees and repair a hernia. “I was in so much pain,” he said, but now things are so much better. “I’m so grateful for what they did,” he said. The first step after recovering from the surgeries was a house he found in Glen Burnie that he shared with three other people, including the landlord. 

Anna Rivera, a Bridges Housing Advocate who has worked with Gary, said he was easy to help. “He’s a really good guy,” she said. “His biggest obstacle is his income, but he is always thinking positively. He’s kind and respectful.” She said he volunteered to do all the chores at the house and was very conscientious and respectful of the others living there. But he wanted to get back to Howard County, he said, and the voucher and Bridges helped make that happen. “I like Howard County because I like being in the country but with a little bit of the city.”  Once near his new apartment, he fell in the snow, but several neighbors saw him and helped him up. “I was so grateful for that.” 

Gary is also a recovering narcotics addict, he said, but has been clean for 37 years. Ironically, his habit of going to NA meetings twice a week helped to sustain him through the worst times. “When I was out there, I would always go to my meetings,” he said. “It’s like NA is a stepping stone to help you with life. You got to believe in yourself.” 

Gary said he often talks to people he encounters at bus stops or on the Regional Transit Authority buses he uses to get around. He encourages people to come to a meeting with him. Often, that doesn’t work, but one time, he said, “somebody I helped was one year sober.” That made him feel good, he said. 

McCray, a single mom of two children, had always maintained a stable home, until the COVID-19 pandemic sparked a landslide of problems that ended with her family being evicted. She spent months in a motel, then a year living with her brother, all while unsuccessfully trying to get a new place to rent. With the eviction on her record, though, nothing worked. All the stress took its toll emotionally, too. “I’ve never been in a situation like this,” she recalled. 

Now, thanks to help from Bridges to Housing Stability, she and her younger daughter have a new townhouse rental, her work has returned to normal, and her life has settled down. Before the pandemic, McCray’s job as a certified nursing assistant involved visiting older, vulnerable people and providing their care. But, when the pandemic hit, she could not visit her patients to do her job. She lost income and fell behind on the rent for her townhouse. She sought and received rental assistance from Howard County’s Community Action Council, she said. Unfortunately, her landlord died, and then a pipe burst in the house. Relations with the owner’s family deteriorated. The rental assistance had paid off her back rent, but the owner’s family was determined to force her out, and eventually, they did – through what she describes as an illegal eviction. Despite all her efforts, eviction cost her much of her furniture, and her younger daughter had to switch schools several times, leaving friends behind. Her older daughter, now 26, eventually moved out on her own. 

“I wanted to stay in Howard County,” McCray said. “I fought to stay in Howard County.” It took her many months and trips to court to clear her record, which finally allowed her, with the help of Bridges’ case worker Jasmine Franklin, to get a new place, she said. Franklin said McCray “had applied to everything,” but clearing the eviction off her credit rating took a long time. “It was a process,” Franklin said. “We worked with her leasing agent to get her housed,” Franklin said. Despite all the pressure she was under, “She was always respectful and very kind. I liked working with her a lot,” Franklin said, noting that McCray kept in touch and did what she needed to do. Bridges came through with a security deposit and first month’s rent, found her needed furniture, and gave her a welcome home basket filled with supplies. 

McCray is more than grateful. “For me as a single parent, I was definitely overwhelmed,” she said, praising Franklin’s caring help. “She has gone above and beyond to get us into a home. She was very consistent.” But looking back now, she wonders how she managed to get through the ordeal and maintain her emotional stability. 

“I don’t know,” she said. "I don’t have an answer. I cried a lot.”  

After Mohamed and his wife came to the United States decades ago from a politically unstable country, they worked hard to build a life. After 15 years of trying, the couple had a baby daughter, now 6 years old. They also rented an apartment and he had a steady job at a big box store. But when Covid-19 hit, his hours were cut. The family was evicted, and after a time staying with relatives, the family spent long months living in an extended-stay motel in Howard County. At age 58, Mohamed said he began to despair that they could escape the economic trap he had fallen into. 

“Believe me,” he said, “it’s been very hard.” Their daughter got Covid and he and his wife were sick too, though not with Covid. They were paying $400 each month to store their belongings. “We felt down all the time -- trapped. But in one week, we were in a different situation,” Mohamed said. “You feel like you want your own space,” he recalled, and now, thanks to Bridges to Housing Stability, they have that space. 

Although both Mohamed and his wife work, they could not save enough while living in the motel for the first month of rent and a security deposit, and landlords would not accept them because the eviction damaged their credit rating. Their motel had a number of families in similar situations, Mohamed said. The school bus came to the motel every day to collect children and later drop them off. 

The principal of his daughter’s Columbia elementary school knew about their problems, and a Pupil Personnel Worker at the school told them about Bridges and recommended them for help. Jasmine Franklin, a Bridges case manager, said the family fit the Bridges Family Home Start Program, which is designed to help families with children enrolled in Howard County schools. They already had an apartment lined up in Ellicott City, and  Bridges agreed after an assessment to cover the first month’s rent and security deposit. Bridges also is committed to working with the family to ensure long-term stability. Mohamed said their landlord, who was himself an immigrant, was happy to accept them. 

“They’re lovely people,” Franklin said, and they are very appreciative of the help Bridges and others provided. They said “thank you so much for giving us a chance,” she added. Bridges provided a welcome basket filled with household goods and cleaning products, a small pink bicycle for their little girl, and they are looking for more furniture to supplement what remained in good shape after many months in storage. 

Mohamed said they moved into the apartment on June 1st and are very happy.  “We’d been looking, looking for six months,” without success, he said. Along the way, he obtained a new, better-paying job driving a wholesale delivery truck, and his wife is working full time at his former big box store. They are working to patch childcare together, he said, depending on relatives and friends for short times when both he and his wife are at work. Despite the move to a new place and a new school, Mohamed said his daughter was delighted to find several children there that she knew. 

At the motel, the room was small and they could never invite guests to visit. Now, once they are settled, they can have friends over. “Bridges helped us a lot,” Mohamed said. “They put us on the right path. They changed our lives, totally.” 

Years of troubles dogged Aliyah and her children, but the final straw that forced her and her three youngest out of their Columbia apartment was the mold and related illnesses that followed after a shoddy repair of a broken water pipe. “It was black mold,” the 48-year-old single mom said, that made everyone ill with respiratory infections and allergies. For someone who was out of work for 11 months recovering from long COVID during the pandemic, it was just too much. She had been hospitalized and had to scrape by on disability payments until she recovered. Then living conditions in the apartment became too much to bear, and the family left in mid-2023, first to her 19-year old’s college quarters for a month. (Her other kids are in elementary, middle, and high school.) They then moved to an extended-stay hotel, until finally, a Howard County school system counselor referred her to Bridges to Housing Stability. 

Now, she and four children are living in a Columbia townhouse, and things have stabilized. An older son is in the military, she said. “They were diligent,” Aliyah said of Jasmine Franklin, a Housing Advocate in Bridges’ Family Home Start Program, and several other Bridges staff members whom she interacted with. “They contacted me within 24 hours. I was really surprised and so grateful. There was genuine care and concern.” Franklin was just as impressed. “She was really positive,” Franklin said. “She’s a great mom for her kids. She really did sacrifice for her kids.” 

Aliyah is a licensed practical nurse and is studying to be a registered nurse. She hopes ultimately to earn an advanced degree. She drives a borrowed car to work in Annapolis every day, but she wasn’t waiting around for someone to rescue her. 

The hotel was expensive, and she was scanning rentals and visiting them, trying to find somewhere to live. By the time Bridges got to work on her case, she had already found the townhouse she wanted to rent and convinced the owner to give her a chance, despite her pandemic-damaged credit rating. Bridges helped close the deal with money for the security deposit and part of the first month’s rent. Then Franklin arranged for donated furniture, bedding, lamps, kitchen utensils -- basically everything needed to turn a house into a home, Aliyah said. Now her family’s life is better, though not all her problems are solved yet. 

She’s still not sure how long she can use the borrowed car, or where she’ll get the money to replace it, but she’s brimming with optimism and thankful to be in a good place right now. “Throughout my life I’ve faced adversity and I’ve encountered a lot of people,” she said. “The team at Bridges is very, very, special. Their attitude, their care and concern…they went out of their way,” she said. “They even found us blankets, washcloths and towels.”  That’s what impressed Aliyah so much, that she never felt like a “client” kept at arms’ length. 

“It’s a time to be grateful and to count your blessings,” Aliyah said about the holiday season. “It’s gorgeous.” 

The multi-pronged nightmare that enveloped Maria and her three children began long before the pandemic, with a years-long marriage to an abusive man who even blamed her for her son’s autism. That was followed by an eviction, cancer, long Covid-19, and long-term disability that knocked her out of a good government job. 

Now, thanks to years of help from Bridges to Housing Stability, she and her mostly grown children are living in a three-bedroom Columbia apartment and getting ready to move closer to family support in another state. 

It was a long, long road, filled with emotional potholes and problems. 

Already beleaguered by unending abuse from her then-husband, the family was suddenly evicted, she said. They ended up in her in-law’s basement for a time. “It was a horrible situation.” She finally worked up the courage to overcome her fear of being on her own, and she took the kids and left, to another basement apartment across the street. Her husband forced his way in sometimes and the fights prompted neighbors to call the police on occasion, she recalled. 

“I was just naïve and I didn’t know what to do. Nobody wanted to help us find an apartment,” she said, but eventually she went to Hope Works, the Howard non-profit that works to help victims of domestic violence. She got a judicial restraining order for protection against her husband’s threats. 

She also visited the North Laurel Community Center and spoke with a social worker who steered her to Bridges, which changed her life. 

In May, 2017, she and her children moved into a three-bedroom condo operated by Bridges. She later finalized her divorce and was awarded full custody of her youngest child, to minimize contact with her former husband. 

“Life improved, a lot,” she said. “Being with Bridges has been a blessing,” the 47-year old said. In addition to housing, Bridges has helped with food, school supplies, referrals for legal advice, and rental assistance while she waited for long-term disability payments to begin. “Without Bridges, I would have been homeless,” she added. 

Kristen Miller, a program manager with Bridges who has worked with Maria’s family, said she is one of the longest-term tenants the program has helped. “She’s great to work with,” Miller said. She reaches out when problems crop up, eagerly participates in Bridges’ educational programs, and “she’s always willing to help someone else. She’s been an ideal tenant,”  Miller added. 

Last year, Maria met a new, supportive partner, though he lost his restaurant job in the pandemic. She had just finished chemotherapy for her cancer, and then the whole family got Covid-19, but all survived. She still suffers from several symptoms of the virus, though. Her cancer is in remission but she is considered “high risk,” she said. “I couldn’t work for two years.” 

Still, she plans to get back to work and save money towards her own house. “I have three job offers,” the former electromechanical technician said. She can no longer do heavy lifting, but she has 22 years of experience in aerospace manufacturing. 

Her new boyfriend is also a blessing, she said, because he helps take care of her, and helps her set boundaries to avoid being taken advantage of. She’d done a lot of reading on abuse, she said, and on how to better protect herself. 

Now her focus is on the future and emerging from what she considers a transitional phase of her life to once again becoming independent and self-sufficient. 

“I really want to keep getting better and better.” 

In 2019, when Kevonne was about to give birth to her second child, she split with the father and began looking for an apartment.

Even then, before the pandemic, she quickly realized she would not be able to afford anything more than a one-bedroom unit. But then she found a listing on Zillow for an affordable two-bedroom apartment in Columbia. The landlord was Bridges for Housing Stability.

Unlike most of Bridges’ other clients, Kevonne was not homeless. She also had a full-time job, a car, and enough savings for a security deposit. She quickly took the unit and moved in. She’s still there, working the same job from her home.

“It was a program to help families, which was perfect,” she said. 

“Everything with Bridges moved very quickly,” she added. “I had the baby as soon as I moved in.” She plans to stay at least two more years, she said, when she hopes to have saved enough to move on. 

Her experience with the Bridges Alliance Program illustrates another aspect of the problems faced by many working people with children in Howard County. Although Bridges has 53 units that on average rent at a 40% discount to market rates, the need is far greater, said Dana Sohr, Bridges deputy director, and the former program manager who helped Kevonne and her children get settled.

“We’re short over 7,000 units of workforce housing,” he said. That means apartments affordable for people making between 30 and 60 percent of area median income. For a family of three like Kevonne’s, that means people earning between $32,713 and $65,427. For a family of two, the eligibility ranges from incomes of $29,078 to $58,157. People in the program can stay as long as they want to, Sohr said. “Alliance is a permanent housing solution,” not transitional housing, he added.

Still, “we’re just a drop in the bucket,” compared to the need, Sohr said, though the Alliance program has grown from one unit in 2014 to 53 now, thanks to grants and donations. Eighty percent of the Alliance participants are single parents, and one quarter have a disabled family member. The average household size in the program is 3.5 people and the average income is $48,384, according to Bridges’ statistics. In addition, 96 percent of households in the program remain stably housed after 18 months, and 53 percent increased their income in the past year.

Sohr said Kevonne’s family fit perfectly into the Alliance program. “It’s extremely hard to afford a market rent,” he said. Kevonne “was working and  organized, but not highly paid.”

Kevonne said the help has been critical for her future, enabling her to start saving money, and she is keenly aware of how rents in the retail market have risen. When she does finally move, she hopes to remain in the county.

“I enjoy it a lot,” she said.  

For May 2023’s client story, we offer a video about Carmen Jones, who rents an affordable home through our Alliance program.

The video, created as part of our advocacy work with the Housing Affordability Coalition, highlights the housing challenges experienced by members of HoCo’s lower-wage workforce. Carmen speaks candidly about the struggles of homelessness and the transformational benefits she has experienced since regaining her housing stability. She is living proof that a stable home provides an essential foundation for success. We thank Carmen for her courage in sharing her story with us.

Watch Carmen's video below:

Resilience is perhaps the word that best describes Gary, 64, whose painful knees along with the pandemic cost him his warehouse job. The loss of his job led to his eviction and a year-long period wandering the streets.

“I was trying to work,” the former truck driver and warehouse worker said, “but after Covid, they let me go. That’s what put me on the street.”

Most of his monthly Social Security income was devoted to child support for teenage children. So, he put his belongings in storage and began scrounging under bridges, at bus stops or wherever he could find shelter. He tried at first to stay in the storage locker, “but I got caught,” he said.

Sometimes, “I’d wake up shivering and shaking, it was so cold,” he recalled of his time on the streets.

Those are painful but distant memories now. Thanks to help from Howard County’s homeless shelter, Grassroots, and Bridges to Housing Stability, Gary found a room to rent from a “nice lady” willing to share her house, and things are looking up.

Alberta Medley, his Bridges case manager, said that Bridges helped him check out his new place and vouched for him, in addition to paying his rent for a period of time. His child support payments will end soon, Gary said, and the resulting growth in his available income will put things right, financially. He has Medicaid for health insurance and receives $40 a month in food stamps.

“He’s definitely an easygoing dude; a joy to be around,” Medley said. “He had been through so much he sort of stays to himself,” she added.

Still, it was a long road. Gary said after months of wandering, he began visiting Howard County’s Leola Dorsey Center to get a shower and wash his clothes, and a worker there helped him get into Grassroots’ shelter.

Even then, it took him most of a year to get to a point where he qualified for help from Bridges, which provides services to stabilize people facing eviction or experiencing homelessness.

Gary found his new room on Craigslist, but Medley made sure it was legitimate. Sometimes, she said, people who advertise a room are about to lose their homes and are just looking for fast cash from a desperate renter. Not in this case. “The landlord is so sweet,” she said. Gary agreed. “She’s nice; she’s really nice,” he said.

“We gave him a welcome home basket with cleaning supplies and personal things, like a toothbrush,” Medley said. He had already recovered so well from his two knee replacement operations that she said she had no idea about the surgeries until he told her about them.

Bridges will pay his full rent for three months, and then slowly lower the amount until Gary can handle it all himself.  In time, perhaps a year or two, she added, he may be able to get a longer-term housing subsidy due to his low income. Gary said he can’t work right now because he has sleep apnea and can fall asleep virtually anytime.

Meanwhile, he’s enjoying the peace and stability he’s regained.

“I’m glad they did this for me,” he said. With the food stamps and an occasional visit to a food bank, Gary thinks he’ll be able to get by.

“It’s going to be tight, but I’ll be able to do it,” he said.

At age 52, Harry is hard at work building a new life. He has a job, a car and a small apartment in Columbia, thanks to his own efforts, support from his former prison chaplain, and assistance from Bridges to Housing Stability.  “I am thankful to be here and to have a new opportunity,” he said, adding that he is taking things “one day at a time.”

“I was making bad decisions at that time in my life and on this particular occasion,” Harry recalled of that day when he was pulled over by police on I-95 in Cecil County while transporting cocaine. The Brooklyn, New York native had come to Maryland to work in a car detailing business. Everything went great for a couple years, he said. But when business slowed down, money became scarce, and he succumbed to the idea of transporting drugs from New York to Maryland. His alcohol abuse and occasional dabbling in drugs added to his problems. “I know I did something wrong,” he said, noting the impact on his nearly grown two children.

His nearly four years in the Howard County Detention Center during the pandemic, as he awaited trial, was the start of his recovery. The chaplain there helped set him on the right path. When he was released to a transitional home operated in partnership between the Department of Corrections and Bridges, he got the more comprehensive support he needed.

Kristin Miller, Bridges Alliance Program manager, said that Bridges has 54 affordable rentals, including a four-bedroom house used since 2019 as a transitional home for men recently released from incarceration.

Scott Sheldon, the manager of the transitional home, said Harry had a spotless record at the jail and seemed more mature than some inmates. He often counseled other inmates while holding a jail job himself, and he was always looking for programs to help better himself. “Our target population are people who are pursuing positive transition support,” Sheldon said. Bridges helped Harry restart his life, obtain a driver’s license, learn about the technological revolution that accelerated while he was in jail, and eventually find more permanent housing. Harry is now living in an affordable rental provided by Bridges.

“I hadn’t been locked up until I was 40 years old,” Harry said, explaining that, unlike some people in trouble or homeless, he already had a history of working and budgeting and organizing a stable life. When he got out of jail and into the transitional home, “my transition wasn’t as hard as some.”

He found a warehouse job in Elkridge through word of mouth and spent an hour getting there daily, taking two buses and walking a mile, and then another hour getting back until he had saved enough to buy a car. Harry lived in the transitional home for one year when Bridges offered him a one-bedroom apartment he could afford. Scott taught him how to save money by shopping at second-hand stores, Harry said and was there as a resource when problems cropped up.  He regularly attends church and when he feels the need, he goes to AA meetings too, all while trying to rebuild links to his now grown children and his three siblings. He’s not making long-term plans just yet. “I just focus on work. I’m trying to piece it together,” he said, adding that by summer he hopes to begin making longer-term plans.

June, a single mom with two young children, had always depended on her partner to handle family finances and decisions, but over their decade-long history, she saw problems growing and knew she’d have to make a major change. 

Knowing and doing are two different things, however, and June needed help. She received it from Bridges to Housing Stability in the form of an affordable two-bedroom rental apartment. 

June said she “always had a really good job,” but she gave most of her earnings to her partner and children’s dad. He was “very controlling and manipulative,” she said, and convinced her to let him handle the money. 

As she passed age 30 and had a second child, she started trying to save money toward striking out on her own, but she also realized she knew nothing about personal finances. “I didn’t know anything about anything,” she recalled, and she was afraid. 

Finally, in 2020 she began researching apartment rents and found sky-high prices that were rising by the month. “It felt impossible because everything was so expensive,” she said. 

She had a niece who had previously received support from Bridges, so June called about finding a more affordable apartment. After several months on a waiting list, that paid off. 

“I will never forget this,” she said, choking up at the memory of getting the call that an apartment in Columbia would be available in April, 2021.” The news came just after another big fight with her children’s dad. “I’d left crying so bad,” she said. 

“Now that I have independence, I’m much more financially responsible,” she said. She had enough saved to cover the security deposit and she works for a major health care company, so her monthly income is adequate. 

Kristin Miller, who manages the Bridges Alliance program, said June’s situation is exactly the kind of difficulty that Bridges was created to address. 

“The Alliance program focuses on increasing the supply of affordable housing in Howard County. Bridges overall works to prevent and end homelessness and housing instability. By housing June’s family, we helped them achieve their goal of securing safe, affordable housing,” Miller said. 

June said she moved herself and the children into the new unit herself. The kids’ dad visits and she has filed for child support too, though he contributes sometimes anyway, she said. Seeking help formally was also a big emotional step, she said, because she didn’t want to risk any more drama or arguments. But she went ahead anyway and “he understood.”   

Bridges has continued to provide assistance, with grocery gift cards to help get past big holidays and Christmas gifts for the kids, too. 

“I wasn’t really going to do a big Christmas for them,” she said, but Bridges said they had a few gifts and when she went to pick them up, she was brought to tears. “When I saw the gifts for them, I was overwhelmed. I did not expect” so much, she said. 

Now, she’s focused on the future. Her family is stable now, and she wants to begin saving for a transition out of Bridges, hopefully in 2024.  

“I've been so much happier with the state of my mind,” she added. 

Financial stability has had another effect, too. “Without the stress and worries over a place to live and money for food, I can be the best mom for my kids.” 

Maggie, a 42-year-old mother of two, has lived a roller-coaster style life these last few turbulent years, but thanks to help from Bridges and other Howard County organizations, she has finally achieved some stability. She has a three-bedroom condo apartment in Columbia, a used car, and two jobs.

“Right now, I’m in a better place, but it’s still not perfect,” she said.

The frightening downward spiral began as she struggled to escape domestic violence. When she and her husband separated in early 2020, she and her kids moved into a friend’s spare bedroom in Laurel. Within days, Maggie was laid off from her Washington job with a government contractor as the first wave of the COVID pandemic closed almost everything down. After a few months living with the friend, who was awaiting the birth of her own child and would need the spare bedroom for a nursery, Maggie and her family moved across the street to join another woman who offered to house them. She knew that situation would not last, though, and actively sought a way out.

“It was only me taking care of everything,” she said. “I lost everything. I felt so overwhelmed.” The family was sleeping on an air mattress for a while. She remained unemployed for a year, she said. But eight months later, her persistent and determined calling for help and filling out applications finally paid off. “I’d been calling everybody,” she said, but ultimately her children’s schoolteachers and counselors connected her with Help End Homelessness Howard County (HEHHC), a non-profit organization that managed rental homes for families earning very low income.

Kim Pace, manager of Bridges’ Housing Connections program, provided case management services for HEHHC’s tenants. She helped Maggie with move-in assistance as well as food resources, school supplies, household essentials, and financial help when needed. (In early 2022, HEHHC donated its program and rental homes to Bridges.)  Maggie got a temporary job at her daughter’s elementary school. She hopes to become a para-educator and permanent school employee. She also works part-time at a local supermarket. Key to her success, Maggie said, was her willingness to reach out and sometimes even help others in a sudden jam.

“I keep in touch with everybody,” she said. “I’m thankful I’m the person that I am,” she added. “I have a lot of friends. People helped me. That’s how I survive. I always think about my kids. They need me. I have great kids,” she said. Pace continues to keep in touch with Maggie and monitors her progress. Things are coming along, she said. “She’s a very nice woman who is dedicated to the betterment of her family,” Pace said. “And she’s determined not to let her circumstances define her.”

Living On A Financial Cliff: Nikki's Story

The perils of living paycheck to paycheck can force people to a financial cliff. Nikki and her family were right on that edge when Bridges to Housing Stability stepped in to steady them. After being told by her landlord that she would have to move because her house was being sold, Nikki spent two frantic months finding a new place to rent. However, she lacked the money for the critical security deposit and first month’s rent.

“This had to be turned around in 4 or 5 days,” said Bola Afolabi, the Bridges Program Manager who interviewed Nikki. “If Bridges didn’t help, she wouldn’t be able to get help from anywhere. She would have been homeless for a long time.” Afolabi and Siju Oshin, a Bridges Housing Advocate, worked together on Nikki’s problem.

Before the landlord’s notice to vacate in May, Nikki and her four children were struggling, but she was managing in a rented townhouse in Howard County. Her two oldest children were in their early 20’s, the younger one in college, leaving her high school senior and 15-year-old still in Howard County schools. She had a steady job, a small amount of savings, and her family had been living in the townhouse for over four years.

Nikki worked as an assistant to young people with disabilities, visiting them at home to help with various aspects of their lives, when in late 2021 an angry client threw a metal object at her, badly damaging her wrist. She had surgery and was slowly recovering after months of physical therapy. She was on worker’s compensation, but ready to resume working, when her landlord told her she had 30 days to move.

“I was in a crisis,” she recalled “My anxiety started building up.” Her children’s emotional stability was also at risk, Nikki said. Her 17-year-old was looking forward to a triumphant high school graduation – not to becoming homeless. Her 21-year-old had to temporarily leave college.

“It set us back and put them back into depression,” she said about her children, who, like so many others, had struggled emotionally during the pandemic. “It brought tears to my eyes,” Nikki said.

She immediately began looking for a new place to rent. She had some savings, but not enough to pay a new security deposit and first month’s rent, and still cover car insurance and maintenance, and the rising prices for everything else. “I didn’t have it,” she said, and she persuaded the landlord to give her one more month in the home.

Finally, as she and her children began sleeping short-term with a variety of friends and relatives, and she was preparing to move her family’s belongings into storage, she was referred to Bridges.

For Bridges, said Oshin, Nikki’s problem was less complex and therefore easier to solve than many other cases where a family may already be homeless, without a regular income and with no car.

Nikki had already found another townhouse she could rent if she had the money and someone to vouch for her -- both things that Bridges can do. Oshin said that in times like these, when rents are climbing and affordable places are hard to find, Bridges works on helping people like Nikki who just need enough money to close the deal and a group like Bridges to reassure a landlord that she will be a dependable resident.

Nikki didn’t need continuous, long-term support. “She had really just fallen on hard times,” Oshin said.

The Bridges team gave Nikki exactly the help she needed. “She was awesome,” a grateful Nikki said about Afolabi. “She really was awesome.”

Now, things have mostly settled down, she said, and she is back at work. Nikki said she has only warm thoughts about Bridges.

“I love the help I got,” she said.

Sometimes one catastrophic event can throw a family into crisis, but more often, it seems like a series of problems pile up, one atop another.

That’s how Kim felt last November, living as a newly single parent with her six children, aged 3-17, in a Howard County townhouse with a leaky roof, mold, and a balky landlord.

“It was horrible, literally horrible,” she said. The landlord put a tarp over the roof and wanted to raise the rent, she added. “It was raining in the house.”

But that wasn’t all. Her partner had lost his job in the pandemic and then moved to Georgia, leaving Kim, 35, with little financial help and three children 6 and under, plus her three teenagers from an earlier relationship.  She was slowly falling behind on the rent, and her hopes of getting cash from pandemic assistance and later from her tax refund were dashed when she learned that someone had already seized them in the kind of fraud that became common during the worst of the pandemic.

“I was banking on my tax refund,” she said. “In the meantime, I was dipping into my savings to pay rent.” She and her children stopped using the top floor of the house because of the leaks and the mold. They all huddled on the lower floors, she said.

Kim realized she couldn’t just wait for disaster, so she reached out to Grassroots, Howard County’s crisis center and homeless shelter, and that made all the difference. Grassroots referred her to Bridges to Housing Stability and the Community Action Council, which paid off her back rent and helped get her other assistance, like a Thanksgiving bag of groceries, while Siju Oshin, her Bridges housing advocate, worked to find her a new place to live.

“She was the kind of woman who wanted to do the best for her children. She had dedication and she was always open to suggestions,” Oshin said. “I really enjoyed working with her.”

It took four months, from November, 2021 until February, 2022, but Oshin found a four-bedroom subsidized unit in Columbia for the family, and Bridges paid the moving costs, the security deposit, and half of the first three months of rent.

Kim is working, but money is tight, she said. She is also getting help going through the long process of collecting paperwork and letters from her children’s doctor, schools, and others to re-establish her own identity with the IRS and get the payments she is owed. In addition, she said, she is working with court authorities to begin getting regular child support, instead of the occasional cash she receives.

“I don’t feel like I have enough income but I manage to make ends meet,” Kim said. “Things are still tight.”

Holding herself together emotionally was also tough, Kim said, especially since her dad, who raised her, died in June, 2021, which was a big loss for her and her children.

“I had my moments,” she remembered, but her children were always her focus. “I had to keep it together for them.” she said.

Still, the help she received was crucial. “I really appreciate the help I got from Bridges, and I also greatly appreciated all the referrals and support they gave me and my family,” Kim said.

After losing his IT job early in 2019, Robert struggled to find another position and eventually became homeless. After his unemployment benefits were approved, he was able to afford motels – but the money didn’t last long. Finally, near the end of 2020 – almost two years after his job loss – he was placed in the Cold Weather Shelter and then in the Grassroots Shelter.  

Once in shelter, Robert was referred to the Bridges Rapid Rehousing program, where he worked with housing advocate Yuri Choi to find stable, permanent housing. His main concern was to find affordable housing in a safe neighborhood near the grocery store where he had found part-time work. With the help of short-term financial support from Bridges and Yuri’s facilitation with a landlord, Robert was accepted for a one-bedroom apartment that met all his criteria.  

Robert reported that after being housed, he felt safe and stable enough to move forward with a serious job search. Five months after being housed, Robert found employment back in the IT sector: a Project Manager position with an salary of $84,000. In addition to regaining stable housing and employment, Robert’s health has improved significantly, and he's eating and sleeping better. He is “beyond thankful” for the support he received from Yuri and the Bridges Rapid Rehousing program.  

To call Makita’s life difficult so far would be a vast understatement. After experiencing a fractured family growing up, abuse as a child, two former abusive husbands, and six children as an adult, the pandemic found her sleeping in her disabled car with her 6-year old and pregnant with her sixth.

“I dealt with abuse and domestic violence. I became homeless,” she said. Even after getting an apartment in Columbia, the chaos continued. Beset by post-partum depression after her youngest child was born and her second marriage failed, she felt alone and helpless.

“I had a breakdown,” she said. “I had to move and I had no help.”

That stress landed her in inpatient psychiatric care for several weeks, while her children were cared for by relatives, until she could get back on track.

Now, at 38, she is progressing, thanks to intensive help from Bridges for Housing Stability. She has a new apartment in Howard County from which she can walk to work. Her youngest, who just turned 2, is back with her, and she has Housing Advocate Danielle Winston and others at Bridges to rely on if she needs more help.

“That’s why her story is such an amazing story,” Winston said. “She does have major accomplishments,” along with training from life skills programs like Getting Ahead, budgeting, setting goals and sticking to them, and getting a therapist or life coach, which is a major achievement in itself these days. Winston added. “I told her, anybody who went through what you went through would have had the same reaction.”

No one can overcome such daunting odds and misfortune alone, and Makita understands her progress. “I’m really thankful for Bridges.”

Makita grew up in North Carolina and Maryland. Her older children are in the Howard County area, which is why she drove up to see them only to have  her car break down. A cousin who lives in Howard could not take her in, and she couldn’t afford to fix the car. Thus began her latest travails.

She did get help initially from Grassroots, Howard’s homeless shelter, which put her up in a motel for a few weeks. Her credit was bad, she said, which complicated things even more. She got an apartment in Columbia and stayed a year, but the landlord did not want her to remain and she had to move right after her baby was born in May, 2020, which sparked her mental health crisis.

The people we most often think of as homeless are single men or single mothers with young children, but Victory doesn’t fit that stereotype. She is one of a growing number of lower-income seniors who are finding they can no longer afford a decent place to live, and without help, are forced to sleep in a car or in a shelter.

Victory, age 63, decided to leave her marriage because she was so unhappy that she felt it was affecting her physical health. She got into her car and drove for hours until, tired, she found herself in Howard County, where she checked into an extended stay motel room.

“I wanted to start over again,” this woman of strong faith said, but she found that objective to be difficult on a very limited budget.

”I stayed in extended stay hotels until my money ran out,” she said. She then spent a number of nights in her car, which wasn’t restful. Forced to move several times a night, she gradually got worn down, but never stopped trying.

”I don’t feel hopeless,” she said. “The Lord is my strength. This is my anchor, my relationship with God. He wouldn’t put anything on me I couldn’t bear.”

Besides, this trial is far less a challenge than those she’s faced before. An aspiring physician in her youth, she worked as an operating room technician in a Pittsburgh hospital until she suffered a traumatic brain injury while setting up the room for surgery. A heavy metal ball attached to a microscope was sitting too low and hit her head, fracturing her skull. It took her seven years to recover, relearning how to talk, walk, and perform other basic functions. She was left with other symptoms including dizziness, which ended her medical school dreams. Then, some years later, a truck hit her in her parked car, which brought back some symptoms she had worked for years to overcome.

She raised her three children (now grown). She worked at a number of jobs, including starting a home cleaning business with a partner. But when she arrived in Howard County, she had little savings and just her monthly disability check for income. It confounded her that although her monthly check was enough to pay the $975 monthly rent in a subsidized apartment for seniors, the management required that her income be twice what it was, in addition to the required security deposit.

She didn’t have it.

“They didn’t care,” she said. “When I got here, I was expecting to find an apartment and see where I was going for the rest of my life.” She was shocked to find that even a bedroom in a private home would cost about what her small subsidized apartment now costs.

“I’ve never experienced nothing like that in my life,” Victory said.

Her days were spent in public libraries searching the internet for a way out. She eventually found Grassroots, which operates Howard County’s homeless shelter, which in turn brought her to Bridges. That’s when she began working with caseworker Kike Fisher-Akinyemi, who has been impressed by Victory’s fortitude.

“She does not give up,” Fisher-Akinyemi said. But despite that good attitude and work ethic, it still took months of work contacting loads of apartment communities to get Victory into an apartment that Bridges is helping pay for. Victory knows that the payments are only temporary, and she is actively working on ways to boost her income so she can stay when Bridges’ help stops.

“Eventually, she will have to be independent,” Fisher-Akinyemi said, which is exactly what Victory wanted in the first place.

Thanks to Bridges, she feels she has a chance to recover her stability and find a new profession. “I know it can’t be forever, but this will give me a year to get on my feet,” she said. The help

from Bridges was vital, she added, commending Howard County for the services it offers people in trouble. “I’m grateful.”

The way Victory answers her phone conveys her determination and faith.

“Hello, it’s a great day to be alive,” she told a caller.

Eliza and Mandy have worked for decades in medical billing jobs, but complications from medical problems snowballed into distress and homelessness that left them reeling for years -- until they finally found Bridges to Housing Stability and received the help they needed.  

Now, they’ve been living for five months in a Columbia condo owned by Bridges, which charges them an affordable rent.  In addition, Bridges staff members – including Kristin Miller and Kim Pace – found donated furniture for them, provided food and gift cards for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and have also helped with vital advice on budgeting and other needs. Now, Eliza and Mandy are stable once again. 

“The Bridges Alliance Program owns and operates 47 apartments and townhouses for people making low to moderate income,” said Miller, the program manager.  In addition to offering affordable rents, the program is often able to house families with rental histories that other landlords wouldn’t accept. 

Their long, fraught tale began in 2016, the two women said. They were living in a Baltimore County apartment when Mandy developed severe back problems that landed her in surgery four times over the next several years. Her long-term disability payments suddenly ended in the midst of her recovery, she said, and the couple could no longer pay the rent. 

Not understanding that they were in danger of eviction, neither was home when the sheriff showed up one morning and put all their belongings out on the street. Most of it, they said, was either thrown away or taken by passersby. It was a devastating blow.

“It was all over the parking lot,” Eliza said. “I thought they’d allow us time to get our stuff out.” Mandy said she was no help. “I could barely move,” after all the back surgery. They retrieved a few things, like some clothing they found outside, and belongings from their storage locker, but irreplaceable family heirlooms, along with their furniture, “was all over the parking lot,” Mandy said. “And then it started to rain.” This occurred just after her mother had died.

“The first night we went to a motel,” Mandy said, and then they moved to an extended stay hotel, which lasted about eight months. “We begged and borrowed money to stay,” she added, while Eliza arranged for them to move in with her mother and older brother. 

After six months there, family tensions came to a boil. Mandy had finally been approved for disability payments, she said, and with the first lump-sum payment she received for the previous months, she thought there might be enough to get a new place of their own.

But with an eviction on their record, they couldn’t find a landlord who would rent to them,  Mandy said. “No one would take us. No one.”  

The tension became too great to bear, and they ended up in another extended stay motel, which chewed up the savings they were relying on. Meanwhile, Mandy had fallen and broke an ankle, making things that much worse. 

“I had no hope. It was very hard,” Mandy said.

But this time, they moved to a motel in Columbia, just a couple miles from Eliza’s job. Mandy dug into her computer looking for a way out and stumbled on Bridges. After her initial contact, it still took months before Kim, who heads the Bridges Housing Connections program, and Kristin were able to find a place for them to live. A previous tenant had moved out of an Alliance unit.

 “It took a long time to get comfortable and relax,” Eliza said, “but now we can breathe.”