From Nearly Homeless To New Homeowners

Urbina, who is employed with a Manassas-based construction company, makes $18.50 an hour, enough, he said, to cover his part of the bills with the help of Bermudez, who has returned to baby-sitting.

"It's not going to be easy," Urbina said, sitting on a large plastic Lego container in the couple's sparsely furnished living room. "But with a lot of willpower and discipline, we can pay it."

Bermudez said that a year ago she and her husband couldn't have imagined owning a place of their own. Now Urbina said they hope to one day add a backyard deck and make other improvements that will allow them to sell the house for a profit and move back to El Salvador to be with family.

Community Lodgings was established in 1987 to provide transitional and low-income housing to residents in the Arlandria area. It owns five apartment buildings, which provide 34 low-income apartments and 12 transitional units to those who qualify and commit to one year of financial and life-skills counseling.

Officials said they recruit some of their clients from homeless shelters. Residents selected for transitional housing put 30 percent of their income toward rent. The rest is subsidized by Community Lodgings, which has an annual housing budget of $600,000 to $700,000 and spends about $25,000 a year on each transitional housing family.

Others have come to know Community Lodgings through the Fifer Family Learning Center on Notabene Street in Arlandria. It offers computer classes, English and math lessons and after-school programs for children referred by their teachers.

Open Monday through Saturday, the learning center is often packed. Adult students double up, two to a computer, for evening classes (there is always a waiting list) to enhance their chances at better jobs, and kids flop on pillows in the small reading room to thumb through the stack of children's books.

At first glance, the bookshelf in the entry hall filled with colorful board games looks like a child's paradise -- until you scrutinize the titles, such as "Sunken Suffixes," "Prefix Pitfall" and "Adjective Silly Circus."

A poster on the wall encourages kids to "use inside voice," "share" and remember to "have fun."

The nonprofit group struggles each year to find enough money to maintain its services. It is constantly soliciting volunteers and donations. Most of the group's funds come from state and federal grants, foundations, the city and its public school system.

"For so long, we were consumed with just surviving," said Bonnie Baxley, executive director of Community Lodgings. "We hadn't been doing the outreach the group needs to grow."

Other organizations and city programs offer similar outreach. The advantage Community Lodgings has, officials said, is location -- specifically its proximity to the people who need help.