Staff, employees and administrators of M&T Bank and Family Promise of Southern New Hampshire celebrated the grand opening of a new transitional housing facility on April 29 with a ribbon cutting last week. The facility will start taking families this summer. (Photo courtesy of M&T Bank)
A national nonprofit serving homeless families with two facilities statewide plans to open its third, and largest, in Derry this summer.
Last week, Family Promise of Southern New Hampshire finished construction at the facility on Peabody Street which will house up to nine families while offering counseling, education and support needed for them to regain stability and achieve long-term success.
The Derry location is an expansion of the organization’s Hillsborough County location in Nashua.
“That’s what 12 Peabody Road is about, having a physical presence in Rockingham County,” said Executive Director Pamela Wellman. “Where we serve, we’ve always had families from… Derry and Londonderry in Nashua. To more efficiently serve families in greater Nashua, we thought it’d be more efficient to have a location within their community.”
With three programs available for families in transition, the nonprofit never turns anyone away, Wellman said. However, those accepted into the residential program to live in the home must have children, be substance free and pass a criminal background check.
The facility also accepts single fathers and mothers raising children, or family members, like grandparents, with custody of children.
“These are families you don’t know are homeless. They’re behind you at the grocery store, on the soccer field with your kids. They don’t want you to know,” Wellman said. “They’re average working families, the fiber of our communities. Family Promise exists to support them and help them rebuild their lives.”
Families do not pay rent to live in the home, which provides private bathrooms, bedrooms and living space to families while kitchens and recreational areas are shared. In exchange for paying rent, families are expected to take full advantage of the family education and financial literacy courses available.
They can spend up to 12 months at the facility before transitioning back into their communities.
“The only thing we want is for them to take advantage of the opportunity to rebuild their lives,” Wellman said. “By the time they leave, they have good credit, a savings account and have built on their careers.”
At the opening ceremony and ribbon cutting on April 29, M&T Bank presented a check for $100,000 to assist the nonprofit in operating expenses such as expanding programs and starting new ones.
“Volunteerism is a core value of what’s at the heart of the bank,” said M&T New Hampshire Regional President Tim Wade. “Quite honestly, we gave them a very hefty grant because of the great work they do inside the community. Helping families get back on their feet is a critical mission.”
The $100,000 was distributed as part of the bank’s $25 million Amplify Fund Committee which promises to put that amount of money back into the communities the banks serve. Nonprofits in New Hampshire received $600,000 of that funding, Wade said.
“We can’t do this without our corporate partners like M&T Bank. We don’t receive state or federal funding, we raise all of the funding on our own,” Wellman said.
“It’s people like that that strengthen us and give us our ability to provide these services to the families in our communities.”
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