Olathe Salvation Army prepares for dozens displaced from condemned Gardner apartments
OLATHE, Kan. (KCTV) - A mobile trailer you’d normally see at a natural disaster sat in front of The Salvation Army’s Olathe shelter and worship center Thursday. Southern Baptist Disaster Relief brought it to help with a different kind of disaster.
“Most of our disasters — tornadoes, hurricanes, or what have you — a large one will displace a lot of residents, but many tornadoes don’t displace 200 homes,” said Lt. Nate Woodard, the corps officer of The Salvation Army of Olathe, which serves all of Johnson County.
A Southern Baptist Disaster Relief volunteer held a laundry basket of fresh, white towels and offered one to a man and his daughter before they walked to two doors. The trailer holds two showers and a laundry facility adding to what the Salvation Army shelter normally has.
“We’re treating it like a disaster, because these families are experiencing it like a disaster,” Woodard said.
They gave residents 48-hours notice to vacate by May 8.
The decision came after a fire truck got stuck on a road inside the complex when the pavement below it collapsed. Gardner City Jim Pruetting said residents had been without water for four days and sewage was being pumped into the streets.
“This is a life safety issue and it was a roll of the dice if we would have given people more time when we knew that there was no emergency medical or fire response that was reliable inside the complex,” said Pruetting.
Johnson County created a crisis line to connect people with housing.
A local non-profit screened residents to determine who was most vulnerable and put 25 households in hotels for seven days. On May 15, that time was up and The Salvation Army of Olathe was preparing to take in all of them.
“Affordable housing is running out,” said Woodard. “The options are running out, because almost 200 households are trying to find housing at the same time, and so some of these families just naturally need a little bit longer. That’s what we’re here for.”
Woodard said the people coming from the Aspen Place Apartments are facing some of the same challenges as those who access their year-round emergency shelter, where people can stay for up to three months.
“They have lost their homes, have found themselves experiencing homelessness, and need time to climb out of what life has dealt them,” Woodard said. “And we’re committed to come alongside them any way we can.”
Woodard stressed that running the shelter has been a partnership.
Project 1020, which operates Johnson County’s cold weather has provided volunteers and expertise staffing the shelter. Southern Baptist Disaster Relief staffs its mobile laundry and shower facilities for six hours each day and is providing dinners every night to the Aspen Place families staying at the shelter.
“We are not alone in this, and we know that we have a community standing behind us and ing us, and we’re so thankful for the we’ve received, not only from the organizations that we’ve partnered with, but from the community as a whole,” Woodard said.
The shelter is available to families and single adults. Anyone who wants to stay at the shelter must check-in and between 7 a.m. and 10 a.m. daily. A short screening process and background check is required and will take place during registration. People with pets can drop them off at a pet shelter that is located across the street from the Salvation Army’s shelter. For now, the additional shelter created just for displaced Aspen Place Apartments residents will be open through the end of the month.
Woodard said The Salvation Army took in seven families last week — people who didn’t get hotel vouchers — and four have already found permanent housing with the help of Salvation Army case managers and Johnson County’s Department of Aging and Human Services.
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