For this week’s Community Conversations, Occoquan Supervisor Ruth Anderson sat down with host ST Billingsley to talk about homelessness and the Landlord Summit in Prince William County on October 6.
Q: What brings you here today?
A: I’m here today because homelessness is indeed a problem in Prince William County, and I wanted to do something about it. So, I have been a major player in a summit that’s coming up in Prince William in early October.
Q: Tell me a little bit about it – it’s a Landlord Summit. Tell me what it’s about.
A: The Landlord Summit is an effort to bring people together that are interested in the homelessness issue in Prince William County. People that want to help. So this might be non-profit groups, it might be individuals, it might be businesses that want to support this effort. The summit is all about how can we move people from their tents, or from their homeless situation, into a stable living arrangement so that we can work with them in terms of job hunting, education, things like that.
The summit will start out with ‘What is the status of homelessness?’ and then it will launch into different ways of helping. But the focus is going to be on rapid rehousing.
Q: The type of people who should be interested in the summit, or that you’d like to have come to it – are they just homeowners, are there any particular non-profits that would be involved with it, or any civic groups, Rotary groups, anything like that?
A: Well, the Lake Ridge Rotary Club is actually helping us with this seminar. They’re very engaged with this. So, we invite all civic organizations – if you care about the homeless issue, if you want to learn about ways to help, that you can practically help, please come. Because you will learn the data of what’s going on and then how important it is to move people into a stable living situation, so that they can be connected with other services in our county.
Services that have to do with food, and education, and financial help. The main purpose is to get these people back on their feet, help them get a job, help them enjoy the dignity of work, so that they can again be providing for their families.4
Q: Where can people learn about the event, and where can they sign up?
A: The best way to learn about it is to go to Eventbrite.com and then attach the words landlord summit. And you can find all of the details there, or you can call my district office at 703-792-4643.
To sign up, click here.
Check back for more episodes of Community Conversations on What’s Up Prince William.
