Westland Housing Program Helps Prevent Homelessness for Veterans

It’s always great to hear such uplifting stories about communities helping veterans in our local area. While Legal Help For Veterans aids veterans nationwide, this story hits closer to home, in the southeast Michigan City of Westland.

The Westland Housing Commission has a Veterans Housing program that provides rent assistance through housing vouchers to income eligible honorably discharged veterans. The vouchers are for rental properties in the City’s Historic Norwayne community.

The housing providers – Veterans Haven, Safe Step and AMR Rentals – provide supportive services, including a Family Self Sufficiency program.

The Westland Housing Commission started the veterans housing program in July 2013, and the commission allocates 20 percent of their housing vouchers for veterans – the maximum allowed by the federal government.

One of the individuals helped by this program was U.S. Army veteran and Westland-native Adam Lull. When Lull returned from a tour in Afghanistan, he was working at Taco Bell and, aside from the occasional night in a motel, he and his wife Rachel were essentially homeless.

Lull is only 22 years old, and his wife 23 years old.

Now the couple has found a home renting a duplex in Norwayne thanks to the veterans housing program. And Lull has started work fixing-up cars with a friend. He aspires to be a police officer someday.

“We’d probably be homeless for a while without this program. We were trying to save up money to find a place,” said Adam Lull. “For a lot of veterans it’s a problem getting a suitable job when we come back. Then you end up homeless.”

Thanks to this great program, that did not happen. Westland’s housing program helps veterans across the age spectrum, from younger veterans like Lull to those in their 50s.

If you’re in the Westland, MI area and would like more information on the Veterans Housing program, you can call the Dorsey Center at 734-595-0288.