‘Angels’ make 7 Hills payment

President: Homeless center now owes group but with better terms

FAYETTEVILLE — Thousands of homeless and low- income residents of Northwest Arkansas will continue to have a place to go for regular meals, showers and case management thanks to an unnamed group.

Lynn Carver, 7 Hills board president, told the City Council on Tuesday a group of “angels,” as she called them, paid the nonprofit organization’s balloon note on the south Fayetteville property that holds its day center.

More than 2,000 residents from all over the region go there for basic needs and assistance, according to the organization’s website.

7 Hills owed more than $325,000 in loan payments on the property by Thursday. A balloon structure means repayment of the loan is due at the end of a certain time period rather than in monthly payments.

Now, 7 Hills will owe the “angel” group, rather than the banks, and under much more favorable terms, Carver said.

“They do not have an interest in owning the property, so it will be in our name. But, should we default on

payments, then they will be in a position to take the property just as if it were a bank,” she said. “They gave us a lower interest rate and we stretched it out over a period of years, so we’ll be making monthly payments. It’s all spelled out and papers have been signed and the balloon payments are paid off. So we’re thrilled.”

7 Hills administrators hope to eventually own the property outright and make it the hub of work and activity for homeless services in the county, Carver said. The flexible payment schedule will help make that a reality, she said.

“Right now it’s scheduled for 17 years, but we have the opportunity each year to pay down toward the principal. So we could do it in a sooner time frame, but they were very kind and didn’t want to burden us with monthly payments we weren’t able to make.”

In 2013, 7 Hills purchased 2 acres at 1832 S. School Ave. for $400,000 to move its day center from Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. Administrators did so without knowing they owed thousands in overdue payroll taxes a former employee neglected to pay.

In addition to operating the day center, 7 Hills also provides transitional housing with about 30 units at its Walker Family Residential Community and offers supportive services for veterans.

The center has faced a dwindling budget amid a rise in the homeless population. It operates on about $1 million, down from about $1.5 million in 2015. Nearly 3,000 people in Northwest Arkansas live on the streets, in shelters or double up with family or friends, according to this year’s point-in-time survey from the University of Arkansas.

That number has gone up about 250 percent since 2007.

The city set aside $103,000 from the budget to keep the lights on at the Walker community. The City Council committed another $150,000 earlier this year to keep everything else open.

Those commitments, along with a renewed publicity effort and community involvement, helped spur the “angel” donation and foster a number of developing partnerships with regional entities, Carver said. The organization still has a long way to go to solve the ultimate problem. Staff members have a workload two or three times more than they should and a concerted, regional effort to target homelessness needs to happen, she said.

“We’ve had an amazing response,” Carver said. “People and groups and organizations making one-time gifts, everything from $25 to thousands of dollars, but we don’t have that consistently.”

Alderwoman Sarah Marsh of Ward 1, which covers south Fayetteville, showed eagerness to tackle the issue head-on.

“Maybe this is an opportunity for us to issue a regional challenge,” she said.