DALLAS – During the winter storm, the OurCalling facility suffered the same fate many Texas homes faced — burst pipes and flooded floors. Despite this, the Dallas nonprofit stepped up and partnered with the city, converting the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center into an emergency inclement weather shelter.
Now, OurCalling is asking for the public’s help in furthering its mission of serving and evangelizing to the unsheltered population by donating to a $12.6 million capital campaign. The money will go toward the purchase and rehab of a new housing facility that would serve the older population of those experiencing homelessness in Dallas. The building will be modeled after an assisted living center with wrap-around services available to its residents.
The facility will be a permanent housing facility where previously homeless and unsheltered individuals would have long-term care by way of full food service, medical, mental health treatment, counseling, and job training. The housing would also have areas for discipleship and community events.
"We began dreaming about this housing plan years ago. It has been in the heart and vision of our Founder, Pastor Wayne Walker,” reads a post on the OurCalling website. "This housing plan is designed to give its residents more than just a space to live. It is a place to become healthy, and to grow in community; it is a place to relax and to play, to connect with vital physical health resources, and a place to experience and grow in faith. When we turn the first key, and our first resident walks through the door, we envision that we will hear a deep exhale of relief as they enter into their forever home.”
Dallas did see an overall decrease in homelessness from 2019 to 2020, according to the Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance. However, the number of unsheltered people experiencing homelessness increased 11.5%. MDHA says many outreach teams, like the OurCalling Search and Rescue Team, are making more referrals to housing from the streets, but the community is still seeing too many people going from one unsheltered location to the next.
OurCalling volunteer Philip Edwards lived on the streets until he found the nonprofit. He now volunteers five days a week washing pots and pans and spending time with staff members, like Brandon Wallace, the OurCalling discipleship pastor. Wallace said years ago, a place like the wrap-around services facility OurCalling is dreaming of now would’ve really benefitted Edwards.
“We do want to create a place, an “in-house” OurCalling for somebody like Phil, who was really struggling in the shelters and it took a lot of time for him to get housing. If we had had something like what we are wanting to build, it would be a place for him to actually have an apartment, a place to live,” Wallace said. "He would wake up every day and get the resources that he needs, as someone who doesn’t have anything living on the streets."
Edwards said before finding OurCalling he was “shacking up in homeless shelters.” He says the nonprofit helped him to feel safe.
"How do you describe them? You have to experience them. They’re rough,” Edwards said. "Before I got here, I didn't have any hope. And that's why I kept coming back."
For Wallace, hearing Edwards' words are encouraging.
“Phil, he’s just a great example of why we're here,” Wallace said. "He was without hope and he was doing what he could do in the shelters. But he started building relationships with our staff and started coming to our recovery classes, our Bible studies and just started serving. And, you know, there was no magical recipe other than just him showing up and being humble and saying ‘This is who I am, where I’ve been.’ And the relationship piece just was really the key, I think.”
Thanks to support from OurCalling, Edwards is in housing and doesn’t have to depend on the nonprofit anymore. But that doesn’t stop him from volunteering his time to the organization that helped him the most.
"If I have a bad day, I come here, I feel better. I forget all about my problems,” Edwards said. "Anybody that needs help, any of the the services they have here, I always tell them that. Anybody that needs hope, I tell them about this place.”
If you’d like to support OurCalling and its goal of creating an assisted-living center, donate here. Contact development@ourcalling.org for more information or to make an offline donation. You can also get more involved with helping the nonprofit by downloading the app.