KANSAS CITY, Kan. (KCTV) – Eden Village opened its first tiny home village for the homeless in June 2024. They will soon be expanding, planning to start construction on Eden Village 2, also located in Kansas City, KS, this spring.
“Eden Village follows the housing first approach for the homeless,” said President Brad Simpson. “In the sense that once you get a person into a secure environment, they feel safe. Then they can begin developing solutions for other aspects of their life, like their mental or physical health. A lot of our neighbors are disabled, both physically and mentally. They can get the wraparound services that they need and focus on that.”
There are 22 homes in the first village. Each is around 400 square feet with a kitchen, living room, bedroom, and bathroom. There is also a resource center with laundry facilities, game days, movie nights, and weekly community dinners. Simpson says it’s where they can also get monthly medical check-ups.
“The whole concept is to build a community or neighborhood,” said Simpson. “When you look at the homes, all of them have front porches and they face each other. It’s designed that way to they can go sit on their front porch, talk to their neighbor, go and sit on each other’s porches and get to know each other. We’ve experienced, since we’ve been here a year and a half now, a core group of people that really have begun taking care of each other. That’s really what we wanted to create.”…