The New Nativity House brings three programs that serve homeless people into one spot, and add 50 units of permanent housing.

Nativity House, Hospitality Kitchen and Tacoma Avenue Shelter has relocated from their original locations on Tacoma’s Hilltop and Hillside. The aim is to give people who have been homeless for a long time better opportunities to become safe and stable.

To achieve that, The New Nativity House offers mental health treatment, AA meetings, alcohol and drug abuse treatment, skills training, education and employment services, financial literacy classes, medical care, veterans services, legal services and benefit screening assistance.

The building includes a dining hall and day and night shelter with 169 beds, up from the current 145. It has storage lockers, a therapeutic art room, laundry facility and expanded meal services. Community partners donate haircuts and foot and dental care.

The 50 small apartments has given a permanent home, with social services, to men and women, including veterans, who are chronically homeless. They are designed on the Housing First model, which has been proven to save taxpayers millions of dollars by stabilizing people who would otherwise be burdening emergency services, hospitals, courts, jails and prisons.