DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A homeless shelter in downtown Des Moines is building a 24-unit, $4.3 million apartment building made out of shipping containers for the chronically homeless.
The Des Moines Register reports that Central Iowa Shelter and Services was recently awarded $2.7 million from the National Housing Trust Fund program and the Iowa Finance Authority to complete the project.
It will be built on stilts in the water retention basin just south of the shelter, where homeless have frequently set up tents. The furnished studios will be about 250-square-feet each.
The apartments are reserved for the homeless who have completed the shelter’s housing program that teaches residents how to be good tenants.
Officials expect to break ground by the end of the year, and open the building in November 2020.
