Taking with them only the clothes on their backs and a small suitcase of whatever they could grab on the way out the door, a local family fled domestic violence. They knew of and escaped to the Bethlehem Inn and were moved into one of the family suites. Quickly, the family was transitioned to NeighborImpact’s rapid rehousing program and the mom, Deanna*, immediately went looking for a job. With 20 years of experience as an office administrator, she thought that it would be easy, but made little progress in Central Oregon’s closed network of “who you know.”
So Deanna took another path; she went to work at a major fast food restaurant. In less than a year, she moved into management and completed the company’s management training program. With the increased earnings, she saved enough to buy a car, clothing, school supplies, and start thinking about and planning for the future. Her new goal is more responsibility in a management position and moving on from fast food management to other higher-paying jobs. Her kids are healthy, happy, and well. The family will graduate the NeighborImpact program at the end of September. Again, this is another family who surmounted tragedy, used an available program to find stability, and thrived once housing was achieved.
* All names changed to protect privacy.
