Homeless impact to be examined at Las Vegas forum
Las Vegas city officials modeled a new homeless courtyard after the Haven for Hope in San Antonio, and Thursday night the Texas campus leader will be here to offer his insights.
The Downtown Vegas Alliance is holding a forum on homelessness at Las Vegas City Hall Thursday, where Haven for Hope president and CEO Kenny Wilson will give the keynote address.
The Haven for Hope is a 22-acre campus in San Antonio that offers homeless people shelter and a range of services.
Las Vegas city officials and representatives from other southern Nevada agencies and local governments visited the San Antonio campus last year, and it served as a model for the courtyard the city created at Foremaster Lane and Las Vegas Boulevard.
Launched last year as a pilot program, the courtyard is slated to move to a 24-hour operation later this month. It will offer open-air space for homeless people to sleep and the goal is to create access to job and housing opportunities, health care and other services.
Local homeless service groups will participate in an “impact fair” starting at 5 p.m. Thursday at City Hall. Wilson’s keynote and the panel discussion will run from 5:30 to 7 p.m., and the impact fair will last until 8 p.m.
San Antonio’s Haven for Hope employs more than 200 people, and has space for more than 700 people to sleep nightly in a secure courtyard.
Contact Jamie Munks at jmunks@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0340. Follow @Journo_Jamie_ on Twitter.
