{"id":6368,"date":"2019-02-11T09:46:01","date_gmt":"2019-02-11T14:46:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/beta.homelessvoice.org\/?p=6368"},"modified":"2020-06-22T20:00:24","modified_gmt":"2020-06-22T20:00:24","slug":"americas-first-nonprofit-motel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/beta.homelessvoice.org\/?p=6368","title":{"rendered":"America’s First Nonprofit Motel"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Andrew Fraieli<\/em><\/h6>\n

In Lake City, Florida a new motel called Motel 8 has been opened, and it\u2019s completely run by formerly homeless. Sean Cononie, the head of the COSAC foundation which has been helping the homeless since 1997, says it is \u201cAmerica\u2019s first nonprofit motel.\u201d He started the project hoping to give the homeless skills for the hotel industry and the opportunity to give them a job.<\/span><\/p>\n

The project took only two months to complete having \u201cbought it, fixed it up and remodelled it within two weeks,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople think that the homeless are bums, but it couldn\u2019t be farther from the truth.\u201d For proof he continues that there\u2019s currently four formerly homeless that work the motel full-time and \u201cI\u2019m trusting the people working there, to open it up, they\u2019re cleaning it, fixing it,\u201d and just day-to-day functions. \u201cIt\u2019s the first project where I\u2019m not really there.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

There is no doubt in Cononie\u2019s voice as to the possible success of this newest addition to the COSAC Foundation, \u201cWe\u2019ve been doing this for over 20 years, our first shelter was a hotel,\u201d he says.<\/span><\/p>\n

This first shelter was an apartment complex the foundation bought in 1999 in Hollywood, Florida and hosted about 300 homeless, some for as long as eight years. In 2015 the Hollywood shelter was closed though and another was opened in Haines City, with the Veteran\u2019s Inn being opened in Lake City in 2017.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Veteran\u2019s Inn was created because, as Mark Targett the Assistant Director states, \u201c1 out of every 4 homeless men have served in the military,\u201d and is now partly funded by the profits of the Motel 8.<\/span><\/p>\n

The aspect of homeless who are capable of working becoming employees of the shelter is a unique aspect of the foundation and covers most jobs at the different shelters, the motel being no exception. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe homeless have always participated [in the different projects]. We train them, they\u2019re very capable,\u201d Cononie says. \u201cThe idea is that if someone came to the motel we can keep them for the night and put them somewhere to work.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He continues that the motel is about 70% full every night and that customers \u201cknow that its run all by formerly homeless, they\u2019re usually impressed.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Fulfilling a need after the last hurricane hit Florida, they even built a pet shelter area of the motel for homeless who may need a place to take care of their pets, and they built it in a day.<\/span><\/p>\n

The motel hasn\u2019t seen any formerly homeless leave to go onto bigger and better things yet, but the project is still in its infancy. With multiple shelters and their previous hotel lasting 13 years before being disbursed in 2015, it\u2019s only a matter of time.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Andrew Fraieli In Lake City, Florida a new motel called Motel 8 has been opened, and it\u2019s completely run by formerly homeless. Sean Cononie, the head of<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6370,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,550,549],"tags":[20,65,121,145,180,196,212,213,278,315],"class_list":["post-6368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-homeless-voice-newspaper","category-local","category-news","tag-andrew-fraieli","tag-cononie","tag-florida","tag-homeless","tag-lake-city","tag-mark-targett","tag-motel","tag-motel-8","tag-shelter","tag-veterans-inn"],"yoast_head":"\nAmerica's First Nonprofit Motel - Homeless Voice<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/beta.homelessvoice.org\/?p=6368\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"America's First Nonprofit Motel - Homeless Voice\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Andrew Fraieli In Lake City, Florida a new motel called Motel 8 has been opened, and it\u2019s completely run by formerly homeless. 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