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Local Woman Recounts How She Became Homeless – Add 1 At the same time, the eviction process had started on my apartment, which I was not aware of, so I didn’t show up at court. Subsequently, I received an eviction. I looked into a variety of shelters in the Twin Cities and wasinitiallyunsuccessful, but scouring a bulletin board, I found The Dwelling Place, which had room for me. While I was grateful for The Dwelling Place,I was eager to find a place of my own ––but I ran into several problems. Because I worked, I couldn’t get assistance. Because I moved into The Dwelling Place, I was not considered homeless. Because I had an eviction, no one wanted to rent to me. I had gone through the coordinated entry process (the homeless response system) in multiple counties and ran into barriers there, too. Fast-forward a year and some months after I entered The Dwelling Place –– my time there was coming to an end. By this time, I had also lost my job. In Anoka County, I was introduced to Partnerships for Family Success, a team of case managers specifically designed to keep families together and housed. I was assigned a case manager who helped me get my eviction off my record, got me set up with Beyond Backgrounds, a landlord risk mitigation program, and helped me find an apartment through the Anoka County Community Action Program (ACCAP). During my tenancy with ACCAP, I had some misfortune: I was in a car accident in June of 2019, and I was also diagnosed with stage 3 cancer in August of that same year. I had surgery in November and was hospitalized in December. I started radiation in January of 2020 and was able to move to my current apartment in June of 2020, during a pandemic, thanks to the Dwelling Place remembering my situation and letting me know I qualified for a Housing Choice Voucher through the Section 8 program. I now continue to receive treatments for cancer, I work part-time, I pay a rent based on my income and my daughter is thriving in school as she recently became a member of National Junior Honor Society. I now pay it forward by serving in my community on a variety of committees to share my experience. My story is not uncommon and yet people with lived experience are all treated the same way. We don’t all have mental health or substance abuse problems. Sometimes life just gets in the way. -more-