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Community of Hope outlines shelter, day‑center operations and casework; cites 249 unique night‑shelter guests in 2024
Summary
Community of Hope leaders told the commission the agency operated a day center and night shelter in 2024 that provided showers, laundry, meals and case management; they reported 249 unique night‑shelter guests, 33 beds plus two cribs, and 46 people housed during the previous year.
Candy Dials, chair of Community of Hope, and Jennifer Pritchetton, interim executive director, briefed the commission on the organization’s three program components: the day center, the night shelter and Welcome Central intake and case management.
Dials said the day center provides daytime services including meals and a place to rest and meet providers. “We are open 365 days a year,” she said, and reported 1,281 showers and 755 loads of laundry for guests in 2024. She said the site also provides meals to people who take them away from the site and referenced a cumulative meals number during the presentation.
Pritchetton described night‑shelter capacity and intake procedures. She said the night shelter has 33 beds and two cribs (35 total capacity), with separate women’s and men’s halls, and that it is low barrier but limited by county residency and the requirement that guests accept basic accountability (weekly check‑ins and a time‑limited stay). “We say, OK. You have 90 days,” she said, while explaining staff hold weekly check‑ins and case‑management meetings to help connect guests with housing, benefits, employment and other supports.
Pritchetton said the shelter served 249 unique individuals in the reporting period and that the average length or nights reported rose to 28.9 nights in 2024 from 23 the prior year; she also said the share of veterans fell from 11% to 10% between the two years.
The presenters discussed services for families and children; they said children are not accepted into the shelter unless accompanied by a parent or guardian and that staff assist families with busing or alternative placements where possible. The group described the Welcome Central intake office, which collects identification, benefit information and housing‑search documentation and provides referral and rental assistance applications.
Dials and Pritchetton described collaboration with local partners including Leavenworth Attainable Housing, Heartland RADAC, the Guidance Center and the VA, and requested volunteers and financial support. They also discussed limits on medical services onsite (monthly medical clinic visits were reported) and said some services previously available on site are no longer provided.
Their summary emphasized housing scarcity: “Homelessness is largely… a housing issue. There's a major lack of affordable housing,” Dials said, and she said Community of Hope housed 46 people the prior year but many guests remain on waiting lists for permanent housing.
No formal votes or city actions were recorded during the presentation.
