Nonprofit group gets leader

Officials: More people will get housing, other services

Northwest Arkansas has a full-time director to oversee the push to decrease homelessness throughout the region, which officials said will mean more people in need will get housing and other services more quickly.

The Northwest Arkansas Continuum of Care, a nonprofit group meant to connect homeless people with assistance groups, has chosen Steve Burt as executive director, its board chairwoman announced last month. Burt led a statewide substance abuse treatment and convict re-entry organization in Nevada for nearly a decade before moving to Arkansas about a year ago.

The Continuum of Care’s 24-hour survey in January found around 400 people on the streets or staying in shelters and transitional housing and at least 2,000 more doubled up with other households in Benton, Carroll, Madison and Washington counties.

“We feel like we’ve moved the needle a lot in the last year and a half, and it’s been completely based on very

dedicated volunteers with very full-time jobs,” said Angela Belford, the board chairwoman. “To have one person who every morning wakes up and says, ‘How do we solve homelessness in Northwest Arkansas?’, we think, is a game changer.”

Burt said his priority is uniting the region’s elected officials and public around the Continuum of Care’s work. The group’s goal is effectively ending homelessness — building a network that can quickly house and help all who lose their homes, whatever the reason.

“I think people are ready, and I think that I came in at a really wonderful time,” he said.

Burt said he joined the substance abuse and counseling field because it seemed like a profession that could help people such as his grandfather and other relatives with alcoholism. People’s life stories fascinated him, he said, and he resolved to help them get back on their feet. He tries to listen to people for what they need instead of assuming he knows better, he added.

Burt was vice chairman for Nevada’s licensing board for substance abuse and gambling counselors and for about 10 years led The Ridge House Inc., which provided substance abuse treatment and several other services around the state for veterans and people just out of prison.

The organization didn’t focus on homelessness, but Burt said the issue is intertwined with re-entry and drug addiction. People out of prison often had no job or home, and many clients needed housing before any other services could do any good. He became familiar with using donations and government grants to that end.

“They were not going to be able to deal with the root causes of why they got into that situation if they didn’t have somewhere to sleep at night,” Burt said. “Who’s going to give them a break when they have a criminal record, when they don’t have resources or a job?”

His points mesh well with the local picture. The continuum has long taken the “housing first” perspective. And local residents and landlords have said criminal and bad credit histories can lock people out of housing even if they have the money for or assistance with deposits and rents.

“You guys are very lucky to have him over there,” said Dani Tillman, corporate compliance officer for The Ridge House, who said she worked under Burt for about eight years. “He is a brilliant, articulate person who definitely focuses on changing and meeting community needs.”

Burt moved to Northwest Arkansas with his husband and their young son before the continuum even began its director search. He said they were drawn by the stable economy and good schools, and his husband was from Oklahoma and had gone to the University of Arkansas.

He worked in the Benton County drug court and as a child maltreatment investigator for the state Department of Human Services for several months each, getting a close look at local poverty, food insecurity and other issues while keeping an eye out for a job with a more community-wide reach.

“We were all looking for a change,” he said. “I really couldn’t have planned it any better.”

An anonymous donation in April offered enough money to pay a director for two years or so, Belford and Continuum board vice chairman John Gallagher said. The amount wasn’t specified at the time, and they refused to say what Burt’s salary is, though they’ll be required to report it in their annual filing with the Internal Revenue Service.

Kevin Fitzpatrick, a sociology professor at the university who has researched Northwest Arkansas’ homelessness for more than a decade, has long said addressing the issue would require a full-time director who wasn’t tied to one nonprofit group or another and could see the big picture. He didn’t respond to an email requesting comment Friday.

Belford and Gallagher said Burt stood out among roughly 50 applicants for the job with his background and familiarity with national housing programs.

“This guy really has what

Burt