Plans for a 120-bed homeless shelter near Columbia’s Business Loop have received a boost, with a $745,000 grant award from the Mabee Foundation.
Our news partner KMIZ reports the Voluntary Action Center (VAC) has been awarded the grant. The planned homeless shelter, which is called the Opportunity Campus, is being built near Columbia’s power plant and the former VFW post.
Columbia’s city council voted in 2023 to approve a permit that allows for the construction and operation of the proposed shelter near the Business Loop. Columbia city manager De’Carlon Seewood’s report at the time says clients at the planned homeless shelter will be single men and women experiencing homelessness. They’ll be able to stay at the shelter for up to 90 days, according to previous 939 the Eagle News reporting. The planned shelter will also include showers, restrooms, laundry facilities and pet kennels.
The VAC’s website says it will also include a medical clinic. “For the first time in Boone County history, multiple agencies will come together in one place to empower our unhoused neighbors to start anew,” the website reads.
KMIZ’s Meghan Drakas quotes the Boone County Coalition to End Homelessness as saying that in October, there were 347 people experiencing homelessness in Boone County.
