Hope Lives Here: More Infrastructure to Fulfill Our Mission

The last three years have highlighted the many vulnerabilities of our current service model which relies heavily on our key allies, churches and volunteers, and is highly susceptible to disruptions. Under our current model, families spend the day at school, work, or our Day Center and in the evening, rotate weekly between church partners who generously provide hospitality, meals, and overnight accommodations. The constant movement of clients between locations can be difficult for families, volunteers, and staff. Additionally, New Pathways currently gets twice as many families needing our services than we can provide, with the local need exceeding our current capacity. While we are so grateful for the support our church partners provide, our mission goes beyond providing safe shelter and basic needs. We strive to provide wraparound support and resources to address the often-complex challenges families face and to remedy them in a way the creates long-term independence and stability. 

As a result of these challenges, New Pathways’ staff and board began to think about building a new facility that would provide safe shelter and case management services all under one roof and increase our capacity to serve more families. This spring we worked with a central Minnesota consulting firm to get community feedback on our vision. Nearly 30 community members were interviewed to gather input on initial shelter designs and to help determine how much funding could be raised locally for this effort. These informative interviews led to a redesign of the project (currently in progress) and New Pathways has studied all the possibilities for raising funds for this effort.

We believe the time to pursue this ambitious and life-saving initiative is now, with our organization strongly and uniquely positioned to lead this effort. This project will increase our capacity to serve eight families at a time, up to 32 people, from five currently, up to 20 people, and will provide the critical stability and dignity essential to housing stability and personal well-being. While there's no "quick fix" for solving homelessness, safe shelter that prioritizes keeping families together combined with intensive wraparound services is a proven, effective strategy to help families get back on their feet and rapidly reconnected with permanent housing, significantly reducing public costs. Our vision includes:

• Private, comfortable units for eight families 
• Warm, home-like atmosphere to promote connection and healing
• Secure, safe facility staffed 24/7
• Dedicated case management working alongside each family
• Play areas for children
• Gathering area with space for support groups, educational opportunities, and events
• Outdoor areas for connection to nature 
• High quality, energy-efficient building standards for long-term sustainability
• Church partners, businesses, and community groups host meals on-site in the community kitchen
• Ideal site, currently being explored, is close to employment opportunities and other supportive services in Cambridge

As plans develop, we will continue to keep our community updated.

To learn more about how you can support this important project, reach out to Mary Westlund at: (763) 691-0121 or director@newpathwaysmn.com, and check out our FAQ.