'I felt like my children deserved a home': Jefferson City families find help amid housing instability

JEFFERSON CITY - It's a process many people in Jefferson City know too well: waiting to get a house, and being denied.

New homeowner Sonya Fletcher jumped from apartment to apartment before she ended up in her home in August.

"I was so frustrated getting denied over and over again," Fletcher said.

According to the 2022 Jefferson City Housing Study, most lower-income people in the capital city are renting. And with rent getting higher, many people are reaching the point of housing instability.

There also are just not enough properties in Jefferson City for people to afford.

Part of the difficulty is because of the 2019 tornado, which destroyed many working class family homes, but those who work closely with people struggling to find housing say this year has been the worst one they've seen in a while.

Organizations like the Salvation Army and Habitat for Humanity are part of the process in helping.

At the Salvation Army, that means taking in as many people as they can.

"We have the most families that we've ever had," Shelter Director Brian Vogeler said. "We have five families living in the shelter. And with those five families, we have 10 children that are currently living in our shelter right now."

The families, Vogeler said, includes those who have recently been evicted because of the higher cost of rent.

Salvation Army takes as many people in as they can, but the amount of housing needed to fill the demand, just isn't there.

"With the lack of housing, you know, it's hard to get some families moved out as quick as possible," Vogeler said. "So we can take more families, but we still are definitely seeing the need for families. Just today, I had three phone calls. Asking about family housing, and single people are also feeling the same thing."

Habitat for Humanity is part of the effort building to change that.

Fletcher found Habitat after expressing her frustrations with how she wasn't able to get a home.

"I was renting an apartment and the apartment that I was at I really I've been trying to get a home loan for probably five, six years now," Fletcher said.

She said she accumulated a lot of school debt from her associates and bachelors degrees, so landlords would say her debt to loan income was too high.

But as a bus driver at First Start, Fletcher knew she would be able to handle it.

"[And I kept saying] I have proof that I can take care of a mortgage like I've got a stable job that I've worked at for years," Fletcher said. "I can make the payments. Please qualify me basically and they kept saying 'we can work with you. We can work with you go ahead and put in your application.' Then, that would just be another knock on my credit score."

So when the opportunity came up for to apply to Habitat, Fletcher did it, not trying to get her hopes up.

Fletcher and her husband Tyler have three kids, and she's been wanting to give them a home for years.

"I felt like my children deserved a home."

Then one August day, the Fletcher family became homeowners.

They moved in and have now lived there for a couple months, enjoying every part of it.

"I really thank God all the time that he provided this for me because my kids, they still tell me, we've been in our home for about a month and a half now, and they still tell me, 'we love our new house! We love our new house! I love my bedroom!'" Fletcher said.

More homes are on the way for two women who also struggled with the housing market.

Amanda Martin and Jessica Holder are in the process of joining Fletcher on the homeowning journey.

Habitat told both of them that their applications were approved, ending their own struggles with the housing market. Now they are putting their hours volunteering at Habitat, to go toward building their homes.

Holder said she tried looking for a home initially with a realtor.

"The house market is just outrageous right now," Holder said. "And for being a single mother, it's kind of hard to find the right pricing in a decent home that you don't have to put extra in TLC into."

Martin said she'd also appreciate a house that doesn't need too much TLC.

"My daughter has some health issues, so with a brand new house, there's not going to be any old carpet or mold issues," Martin said.

All three women say they're excited about their houses, but they understand the frustration of being in the position of not being able to afford one.

Though these organizations help, they do know that there's an extent to which they can't help everyone. If too many people show up to the doors of Salvation Army, or too many people apply for a house from Habitat for Humanity, they can't fill all the spaces.

Part of the city's plan is to build more affordable housing with the money they received after the 2019 tornado. But some city council members disagreed with the housing, with the vote coming down to a close 6-5, with Mayor Carrie Tergin breaking it.

Habitat for Humanity's executive director Susan Cook-Williams said part of that is because council members might not know what affordable housing would look like in Jefferson City.

"I think there's just a misconception of who it is that is looking for affordable housing, because when we talk about affordable housing, a lot of people think of Section eight, and that has almost a derogatory connotation to it," Cook-Williams said. "But it's really the people who work at our restaurants, it's our teachers, it's our police officers. There's all kinds of people that fit into that range that are looking for that affordable housing."

Jefferson City is holding a housing conference on Oct. 25 in hopes of changing that view on affordable housing. The Capital City Housing Conference is open to the public and will cover the state of housing in the city.