Thanks to the Illinois COVID-19 Response Fund, Housing Action Illinois subgranted $10,000 to the Shawnee Development Council to support the agency’s work providing short-term rental and mortgage assistance, as well as utility assistance.
In response to COVID-19, the Shawnee Development Council has been working in partnership with local sheriffs to offer vouchers to a motel in the evenings and weekends — times the agency is normally closed. In addition, the organization is helping individuals and families pay their gas, electric, and water bills.
The agency is no longer seeing clients face-to-face, and is taking applications over the phone. The Shawnee Development Council will locate those in need of assistance using its own client records, as well as advertising through fliers, its website, and news releases. It serves Alexander, Hardin, Johnson, Massac Pope, Pulaski, and Union Counties.
Thanks to the Illinois COVID-19 Response Fund, Housing Action Illinois subgranted $10,000 to the Shawnee Development Council to offer short-term rental and mortgage assistance, as well as utility assistance. The Shawnee Development Council served twenty-six people with the funding, including one senior and fourteen children. It provided utility assistance to seven households and short-term rental and mortgage assistance to three households.
The agency used the funding to make assistance available to those who had exhausted benefits available through the state’s Low Income Home Energy Assistance program.