Drake Residents Relief

For Drake Residents

The FNA form has now been closed as the funds available have been distributed. Pillsbury United has been brought in with greater staff capacity and more funds to assist Drake residents. For all financial assistance through Pillsbury, please contact: Jacara at jacaraw@pillsburyunited.org.

We are so grateful for the opportunity to serve as on of the first agencies to help release funds and get families housed. It was a pleasure and honor to work with so many of you.

FNA's role with Drake residents

The historic Drake hotel in downtown Minneapolis experienced a devastating fire at 3am on Christmas day. We are deeply grateful that no one was hurt. Since then, residents have been housed at First Covenant downtown, at friends homes, and scattered throughout a couple select hotels.

From the beginning community members have been showing up, caring, advocating, and assisting Drake residents. Our neighbor Mysnikol Miller, who has been on the ground from the beginning as a community member helping and assisting, asked FNA to act as a fiscal agent in an effort to release funds through the Minneapolis Foundation to directly help residents.

$25,000 was released by the Minneapolis Foundation to the Folwell Neighborhood Association (FNA) on Dec. 31, 2019 to cover immediate housing needs such as direct deposits, application fees, and first month's rent for former residents of the Drake Hotel. FNA committed to release all $25,000 for housing needs. No overhead costs or admin fees were removed from this fund. All time dedicated to these efforts have been volunteered.

FNA participated in the Red Cross MARC event on Jan. 3 -4, 2020 connecting with residents to begin releasing the funds. A form was created on our website for residents to apply and volunteers were available at First Covenant to connect with residents.

As of Jan. 18, 2020:

• $20,859.27 has been distributed to 16 families. These 16 units have all been relocated into housing. This has come in the form application fee's, direct deposits, Jan rents, prorated Jan rents and a couple Feb. rents. The closer we move to the end of January, assisting with Feb rent to provide stabilization is needed.
• $9,721 has been promised through Letters of Guarantees for an additional 7 families.
• We have been assisting with another 5 families who have filled out the form, but currently don't have housing options.
• FNA received an additional $7,422 in donations.
• FNA has $1,842 left.

With funds running low, FNA has closed our application form. We are committed to following through with each of the families that have reached out to us. All of them are in different various stages of rehousing. If/when they are all housed and there are funds left over, that money will be redistributed to Pillsbury United. They received $250,000 from the Minneapolis Foundation to assist residents. They have greater staff capacity to provide better resident care, and larger funds to address to greater needs. FNA will be sharing all of our funding commitments with Pillsbury to assist with equitable distribution to residents. For the sake of privacy, we will not post families names whom we have helped or allocation amounts, but that list has been given to the Red Cross, Hennipen County and Pillsbury to ensure all residents are receiving the care and help they need.

Donations

The FNA is no longer collecting donations on behalf of the Drake residents. 100% of funds dedicated to Drake Hotel Residents that went through the FNA have been or will be used to support residents. FNA has not and will not take any funds from donations or grants to assist with organizing efforts or admin costs.