A “new beginning.”
That’s what Borromeo Housing, Inc.’s new home in south
Arlington is for 23-year-old resident Davine Hamlin and her
1-year-old son.
“This is my first home,” said Hamlin, standing Tuesday
morning in the house’s shaded yard, surrounded by members of
the Arlington community and a white picket fence. Before
Borromeo Housing’s Elizabeth House, the single mom had lived
in a shelter. Not any more.
The four-bedroom house, the first property owned by Borromeo
Housing in more than a decade, will serve as a springboard
for Hamlin and three other mothers and their children as they
attend school, find jobs and prepare for their future. The
residents will move in the first week of October.
“We are thrilled that this new home is officially opening,”
said Joy Myers, executive director of Borromeo Housing. “It
provides a healthy, nurturing place where adolescent mothers
and their children – who need a safe, stable and supervised
environment – have the opportunity to succeed.”
Elizabeth House isn’t the name of the house, rather the
program in which approximately 75 mothers and children
participate each year. In addition to the four families who
will live in the new house, Elizabeth House serves four other
families in rental properties.
“We are not a shelter program, we are an education-focused
program that provides shelter to homeless teenage mothers,”
Myers said. “It doesn’t feel like a shelter, it feels like a
home.”
Elizabeth House’s staff focuses on the long term: teaching
residents how to care for their children, employ basic life
skills and plan for the future.
Owning a house was Myers’ goal when she joined the Borromeo
Housing staff three years ago.
“We knew that we couldn’t find sustainability in rental
housing,” Myers said. “We decided that we would make it a
priority to own a property that could never be taken out from
underneath us.”
In March, Elizabeth House’s home was purchased using funding
from a private foundation and citizens, many from St. Charles
Borromeo Parish in Arlington, and a $300,000 Community
Development Block Grant award from Arlington County. The next
six months were spent making it safer and handicapped
accessible.
Each mother and child will share a bedroom, and two living
spaces and kitchen areas will serve as public space. Borromeo
Housing will staff the home via an office in the basement.
The house is equipped with high chairs and cribs, and Tonka
trucks, bassinets, plastic toys and board books fill a corner
of the downstairs living space. Photos of babies and their
mothers hang on the walls. Each of the fence’s white pickets
is available to “sponsor” for $150, and there are plenty more
left to go around, Myers said.
“This is the dream right here, this gorgeous house,” said
Deanna Cobb, founder and former executive director of
Borromeo Housing who attended the ceremony.
One who will benefit from the “dream” is resident Madeline
Glenn, 19, the mother of 16-month-old Marie Claire. A
participant in Elizabeth House for nearly two years, Glenn
will be able to reside in the home while attending Northern
Virginia Community College. Her goal is a degree in marketing
and, ultimately, self-sufficiency.
Elizabeth House has introduced her to a support system – “a
group that I have to lean on about what it’s like to be a
single mother,” Glenn said. “Having the love and the care and
the friendship makes me feel like I will be able to succeed.”
“Borromeo Housing in my mind goes right to the core of who we
are as a community,” said Barbara Favola, vice chairman of
the Arlington County Board. “We are helping young moms who
have no support system … but who have the next
generation to raise.”
Elizabeth House enables young mothers to nurture their
children while fulfilling their own potential so they can “be
the kinds of parents their children can be fully proud of,”
said U.S. Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va. “We ought to be doing it all
over the country.”
“God’s here,” said Madelyn Callahan, president of Borromeo
Housing’s board of directors, standing in the front hallway
of the brick house. “All of this was answered prayers. My
hope and my prayer is that we can keep doing this – more
homes and more opportunities.”
For more information go to borromeohousing.org.
