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Eden Village could end homelessness in America · Cultural Wars | America Out Loud News

• 0:08
  You're listening to the Hidden Lightness on America Out Loud Talk Radio.
• 0:12
  I'm your host, Jimmy Hinton.
• 0:14
  Yesterday I was talking about homelessness and a particular individual who helps to feed them.
• 0:21
  And she doesn't just feed them.
• 0:23
  Gloria also has her husband work on their cars.
• 0:27
  They provide transportation, uh, some housing, and it's a really, really cool thing that they're doing.
• 0:33
  They've given over 270,000 meals to homeless people in the past several years.
• 0:40
  But I want to transition today to talk about the housing crisis because I had mentioned in that particular show that the housing crisis is really what's facing homeless people and even driving homelessness here in the United States of America.
• 1:00
  And I know I don't want to kind of leave that out there as if there's no solution to it, because there are solutions.
• 1:09
  And the government, in my opinion, is never the solution.
• 1:16
  Maybe they can help, maybe maybe they can be a part of the solution, but they're not the solution.
• 1:25
  I believe it's always up to we, the people to act.
• 1:32
  And that's it.
• 1:33
  It's literally as simple as that.
• 1:37
  You know, we can either make this as simple or as complex as we want to, but I choose the simple path.
• 1:46
  And I want to introduce you to a uh an individual or a couple who began a few years ago with a vision and have now turned this into a nationwide movement.
• 2:00
  And I've mentioned this so many times before.
• 2:03
  They the tiny houses, I think, are such a good solution.
• 2:08
  They're such a good solution.
• 2:11
  And uh I I saw my mind's kind of all over the place.
• 2:16
  Um, but I I will get zeroed in here, trust me.
• 2:20
  Uh, but I saw a recent post, and this just came to mind.
• 2:25
  It was it's it's a young Amish guy, and he goes by the name, uh, you can look him up on social media.
• 2:31
  He's stinking hilarious.
• 2:33
  He was on the Theo Vaughn podcast, and that's how he came to fame, and now this dude is all over the place.
• 2:40
  But he goes by uh, I think it's Amish dude or little Amish dude, and he's absolutely hysterical, and uh you got to check this guy out.
• 2:51
  Go support little Amish dude.
• 2:53
  Uh, he's he's just making a difference in the world, and he's bringing a lot of laughter to people, and I always appreciate people who have a good sense of humor.
• 3:04
  But he was asked about the homelessness, because he he's he's going around and all these other social media influencers are taking little Amish dude across the United States, and he's going into these cities, and he's just flabbergasted at the homelessness, and he's like, I don't get it.
• 3:26
  He's like, he calls them outdoor people.
• 3:29
  He's like, There are all these outdoor people laying on sidewalks, and they were like, Well, a little Amish dude, what would you do about this problem?
• 3:38
  He's like, Well, I I wouldn't be in that position.
• 3:42
  He's like, I just don't understand it.
• 3:44
  He said, I'd get a hammer and I'd just start, I'd start building a house.
• 3:51
  And I thought, like, listen to how people who live a simple life come up with solutions.
• 4:03
  You see, in in the Amish communities, there is no such thing as homelessness, it doesn't exist, it's foreign to them.
• 4:16
  And I know we have Amish all around us.
• 4:18
  I I uh I have an Amishman that uh that is my he's my meat processor.
• 4:27
  Uh he's he's my butcher, and he's absolutely fantastic.
• 4:34
  But you know, I I grew up working with the Amish.
• 4:38
  I worked on a farm and I worked with the Amish, so I you know, we know the culture really well.
• 4:42
  I mean, they're all around us.
• 4:46
  And homelessness does not exist.
• 4:50
  Their answer is, well, if somebody doesn't have a house, you just build one.
• 4:59
  And so for him, it was so foreign, this idea that there are people living in the streets in all kinds of weather, and he's like, I just don't understand.
• 5:10
  And people are walking by them like that's normal.
• 5:15
  He was so utterly flabbergasted, just confused, and legitimately.
• 5:24
  Um, and he's right.
• 5:28
  Actually, I'll just play that clip of Amish dude here.
• 5:31
  It's a super short clip, but it's I know he's being funny here, but uh, but part of it is he's actually confused about it.
• 5:40
  And uh, I just I want you to I want you to hear this for yourself.
• 5:45
  The culture shocks are seeing all the homeless people.
• 5:47
  Oh, dude, yeah, it's like crazy.
• 5:49
  Why don't you build a house?
• 5:55
  They're like take fentanyl and stand and sleep and that's called the fentanyl lean.
• 6:00
  Instead of like taking fentanyl.
• 6:03
  I may have cut that off uh a little too early by accident, but uh he was saying, you know, some of these people are especially talented.
• 6:14
  He's like, yeah, just get a hammer, just build build a house.
• 6:18
  I don't get it, I don't understand it.
• 6:20
  But he said some of them are especially talented, they uh they take fentanyl and they fall asleep standing up.
• 6:27
  And while he was kind of joking about that, uh he's not wrong about having talent.
• 6:34
  Like it takes a lot of effort to live out on the street.
• 6:41
  It's not easy, it really is not easy.
• 6:45
  And uh it's it's a tough life.
• 6:47
  It's a tough life that I wouldn't wish on anybody.
• 6:50
  And so it's this idea.
• 6:52
  See, he was he grew up in this mentality where when you live as part of a community, you take care of that community, and we've so idolized individualism here in the United States that everybody wants to be individual, and we live that way, and that's how we're able to see homeless people literally laying on the street in a puddle of their own pee and poop, and sometimes people step over them.
• 7:21
  They'll literally step over somebody who's lying in the street.
• 7:26
  I mean, it's really incredible.
• 7:29
  So he grew up in in a culture where that's not acceptable.
• 7:34
  When somebody's in need, you take care of somebody in in need.
• 7:37
  You uh you throw a hammer at them and you say, okay, start to build.
• 7:43
  Don't lay around, start to build.
• 7:45
  It will help you, we'll help you build a house.
• 7:49
  So that's where we shift.
• 7:52
  And this story brings us to Springfield, Missouri.
• 7:56
  There's a realtor who abandoned, he she transformed abandoned properties into tiny home villages.
• 8:03
  I've been talking about tiny homes for a long time as a viable solution for young people.
• 8:08
  We've got to get this out of our heads that the American dream is to buy this big huge house that we can't manage, we can't take care of anyway, because it's it's so big, and we're busy, and so the dumb thing is is always in disrepair, and somehow that's the American dream.
• 8:26
  You rack up 30 years of of mortgage payments.
• 8:32
  I I absolutely can not, will not, did not fall into that 30-year mortgage garbage.
• 8:42
  I I just I don't believe in them.
• 8:45
  Unless somehow you're able to manipulate that and and use the debt for for good.
• 8:51
  There is such a thing as good debt.
• 8:53
  I just that's not my style.
• 8:58
  Uh we paid our house off 15 years, and that felt like an eternity.
• 9:04
  Uh I would have rather paid cash.
• 9:06
  That's uh, you know, we're we're teaching our kids that you either pay cash for a house or you pay it off in 15 years max.
• 9:17
  You know, and unless you're using good debt and uh, you know, you're using these as rental properties uh to pay for the assets, etc.
• 9:26
  etc.
• 9:27
  But all that to say this idea that you have to have this huge house, and that that's somehow the American dream, and and have such heavy debt that you can never get out of it.
• 9:41
  That doesn't sound like an American dream.
• 9:43
  It sounds like an American nightmare.
• 9:44
  So I've been on this tiny home kick uh for a long time, and I just love it.
• 9:49
  I think they're they're simple, they're cute, they're uh they're uh efficient, and they just make sense for.
• 10:00
  People living in homelessness, they they make a lot of sense.
• 10:04
  Lo and behold, here's one woman who transformed abandoned property.
• 10:11
  She's a realtor by profession.
• 10:12
  She transformed abandoned properties into tiny home villages to create permanent housing to chronic homeless.
• 10:25
  This is another good news network story.
• 10:28
  It's it's dated.
• 10:29
  It's from 2021, but a lot has transpired since this story published in 2021.
• 10:36
  I mean a lot.
• 10:38
  And I'm going to talk about all that as the show unfolds today.
• 10:41
  I'll read a little bit here.
• 10:43
  For nine years, Linda Brown and her husband David organized a nightly drop-in shelter where homeless people in Springfield could eat, shower, do laundry, use a computer, and socialize during bingo games and karaoke.
• 10:58
  But they wanted to do more.
• 11:01
  So they transformed an abandoned mobile park mobile home property into a village of tiny homes that provides permanent housing to the chronically disabled homeless.
• 11:14
  They raised, you ready for this, 4.75 million dollars and opened Eden Village in 2018.
• 11:25
  I love this because uh, for one, my daughter's name is Eden.
• 11:31
  And I just I love that name.
• 11:34
  I love the feel, I love the vibe.
• 11:36
  Just such a cool thing.
• 11:38
  So they raised four and three quarter million dollars in 2018, and they opened up Eden Village, erecting 31 tiny homes that are now occupied by people like Jonathan Fisher.
• 11:52
  He was battling substance abuse and have lived on the streets for two years when he met Linda Brown, who changed his life.
• 12:04
  Fisher went on to say, in the worst moments of my life, Linda gave me guidance, care, and made me feel like I was still worth something.
• 12:14
  He said that Brown took the time to learn about how he became homeless.
• 12:19
  And then encouraged him as he rebuilt his life.
• 12:23
  She even offered him a job.
• 12:26
  You see, this is what I'm talking about.
• 12:29
  This is what it takes.
• 12:31
  This is not easy.
• 12:33
  It's not magic.
• 12:34
  There is no magic wand that fixes all this.
• 12:39
  And a lot of people don't want to walk people through this journey.
• 12:45
  It takes extreme patience.
• 12:48
  It takes an exorbitant amount of time.
• 12:51
  It takes money.
• 12:54
  It takes networking.
• 12:57
  We have to get out of this individualistic mindset, and we have to partner with other people.
• 13:02
  Now, you can still maintain your individuality.
• 13:06
  I'm not saying that we all have to uh abandon this idea that we're all individuals.
• 13:13
  I love individualism.
• 13:15
  I absolutely love that about American life.
• 13:20
  You know, that we have we each have the unique opportunity to be ourselves to chase our talents and our dreams, and we don't have to bend to the rules of a community.
• 13:37
  Right?
• 13:38
  So I celebrate it.
• 13:39
  I absolutely 100% celebrate the individualism of this nation, but when that becomes our God, and we eliminate any social factors or community, social community factors.
• 13:55
  I think it begins to create a lot of problems.
• 13:58
  We have to network with people, we have to work together with people.
• 14:01
  We can't do this on her own.
• 14:04
  Even Jesus, when he sent his disciples out, he sent them out two by two.
• 14:08
  He sent them in pairs.
• 14:09
  Why?
• 14:11
  Because we can't accomplish these things by ourselves.
• 14:17
  We have to work with other people.
• 14:20
  So Fisher, who was a drug addict, uh, he talks about how Linda, Linda Brown, she changed his life.
• 14:29
  She sat with him.
• 14:30
  She offered him a job.
• 14:33
  Now sober, Fisher works full-time for Brown doing construction and maintenance on the 31 homes and helping others experiencing struggles similar to what he went through.
• 14:45
  The driving philosophy behind Eden Village is the same that fuels the housing first movement.
• 14:54
  The root cause of a person's homelessness cannot be thoroughly addressed until his or her immediate housing needs are met.
• 15:04
  Now I have mixed feelings on the housing first initiative.
• 15:11
  Because we see things like California adopt this, housing first, and they pump all this money, taxpayer money, billions of dollars of taxpayer money.
• 15:24
  They pump into the housing first initiatives, but they don't actually help people get well.
• 15:30
  And that's the difference between a government-run program and people who have a vested interest, like Linda Brown.
• 15:40
  You see, this is her property.
• 15:43
  And so she becomes kind of the mother hen of the property.
• 15:48
  She becomes the watcher, she becomes the uh the confidant.
• 15:52
  She becomes the person who manages and oversees all the operations.
• 15:58
  And that's where housing first can work.
• 16:02
  But when the government does nothing but pumps money into the pockets of people, they get them housing, but they don't address the drug addiction issues.
• 16:10
  They don't address the jobless issues when they don't address the problems or some of the root causes of what caused the homelessness.
• 16:23
  It becomes a problem.
• 16:24
  Housing first doesn't work unless you start addressing all these other issues.
• 16:30
  But if you address these other issues, housing first can work.
• 16:35
  Obviously, it worked in the case of Linda.
• 16:38
  As the show unfolds, uh, we're gonna see just how well this is working.
• 16:42
  It's really incredible.
• 16:43
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• 16:45
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• 16:56
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• 17:00
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• 18:35
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• 18:36
  Kelly Victory with the wellness company, and I know this personally.
• 19:21
  She was a realtor or is a realtor, and she decided she was going to do something about the homeless problem in Springfield.
• 19:30
  She had seen a lot of homelessness, and uh it really tugged on her heartstrings, and she got this aha moment.
• 19:39
  It was like this this tugging on her heart, and she had an aha moment where this nagging feeling wouldn't go away, and it said, Why don't you open up a homeless village, a tiny home village that addresses the homelessness in Springfield?
• 19:59
  She named it.
• 20:00
  Eden Village.
• 20:02
  Absolutely love that name.
• 20:04
  That's the coolest name ever.
• 20:08
  Linda had this to say.
• 20:10
  I watched as my homeless friends walked off into the darkness to a hidden, wet, cold camp while we went home to a worm bed.
• 20:22
  That's what she told the National Association of Realtors who honored her with their good neighbor award in 2020.
• 20:32
  She simply said, I had to do something.
• 20:36
  You see, it's really hard to get a good night's sleep when you're haunted by the fact that you actually see the faces of people who are living in homelessness.
• 20:49
  When you see their faces, when you hear their stories, when you know that they're going right back out to the street, and I know this feeling, I get what Linda's talking about.
• 21:00
  I totally relate to this on a hundred different levels.
• 21:06
  We've helped many, many people.
• 21:10
  Put them up in a hotel room.
• 21:13
  We had one young woman who uh, my goodness, it was just it was pouring down rain.
• 21:18
  It was like 40, 42 degrees, just hovering a little bit above freezing.
• 21:23
  She's soaking wet.
• 21:25
  And one of my church members saw her outside and said, Hey, uh, do you need help?
• 21:37
  And she very politely said, No, I'm okay.
• 21:43
  And my good friend and church member said, You don't look okay.
• 21:49
  Do you need a place to stay?
• 21:52
  And she said, Well, yeah, I suppose I guess.
• 22:00
  Well, he found out pretty quickly she was homeless.
• 22:04
  She was trying to survive, living in the pouring down rain with no shelter.
• 22:10
  He said uh all she had was a t-shirt and a pair of jeans.
• 22:16
  She had nothing.
• 22:19
  No bag, no other clothing, soaking wet.
• 22:25
  He brought her into his home.
• 22:31
  And she uh was made up a bed, spent the night, was fed.
• 22:39
  Uh, I went the next day, and uh we were able to put her up in a hotel for a couple nights, got her some food, uh, got her a couple uh couple gift cards for more food, and uh she was so grateful, so humble.
• 22:56
  And uh, you know, it like seeing seeing her face, hearing her story, uh, trying to understand where she's coming from, how she got there.
• 23:07
  Uh, it really, really, really does tug at your heartstrings.
• 23:11
  And Linda's absolutely right.
• 23:13
  How do we go home to our warm beds when we know that there are people right literally, I mean, a block or two away from our house who are living in those kinds of conditions?
• 23:22
  It's really, really difficult to go to sleep knowing that.
• 23:29
  And we have a really good uh relationship with our homeless shelters uh here in town, and they're just that they're absolutely fantastic, but this is a it's just a chronic issue.
• 23:44
  So Linda had this idea, and after getting sponsorship money from Coldwell Banker, the greater Springfield Board of Realtors, local banks, churches, area residents, right?
• 24:02
  She she's tapping all these resources, which is brilliant.
• 24:06
  Like this lady is Linda's so brilliant.
• 24:10
  Absolutely want to hug this lady and just tell her what an inspiration she is.
• 24:15
  And believe me, the ideas are rolling around in my head right now because homelessness is a major issue where I'm from.
• 24:25
  It's such a big issue.
• 24:28
  So she's getting money from Coldwell Banker, Greater Springfield, Board of Realtors, local banks, churches, area residents.
• 24:37
  By February 2019, she said all 31 tiny homes, which cost about 42,000 each were occupied.
• 24:49
  That's brilliant.
• 24:51
  And you got to see these.
• 24:53
  Uh, I'll post these articles to the show notes, but they're so cute.
• 24:58
  They're they're really cool looking houses.
• 25:02
  But Linda said it takes someone who wants to do something and then believes they can.
• 25:09
  I have chills right now.
• 25:11
  Just that statement.
• 25:13
  This is everything that this show stands for.
• 25:16
  It takes someone who wants to do something, and then believes they can.
• 25:25
  Uh, that's really incredible.
• 25:28
  Actually, I misquoted.
• 25:30
  That's not Linda who said that.
• 25:31
  That's Nate Schulter, who helped launch a tiny home village for the homeless in Austin, Texas.
• 25:42
  Um, he said, I've watched Linda Brown live that out.
• 25:46
  You have to want something and then believe you can do it.
• 25:50
  That's it.
• 25:51
  Jesus talks about this, doesn't he?
• 25:54
  He said, When you pray, believe that you have already received it.
• 26:01
  And dot dot dot, it will be yours.
• 26:08
  I absolutely love that.
• 26:10
  And I believe it.
• 26:11
  I believe that to be true, and that's why I constantly turn to my faith for help in every aspect of life.
• 26:19
  I don't believe that we can do life on our own.
• 26:24
  None of us can.
• 26:31
  A nothing.
• 26:33
  We can't accomplish anything without the help from Jesus Christ, our savior.
• 26:41
  I fully truly honestly believe that the solution to the homelessness in our nation is right in front of our eyes.
• 26:49
  It's like uh Amish dude.
• 26:53
  Yeah, just uh get a hammer and build a house.
• 26:57
  What do you think of the homelessness?
• 27:00
  Well, I don't understand it.
• 27:01
  Just grab a hammer, build yourself a house.
• 27:08
  I mean, it sounds so simple that that people laugh at that.
• 27:13
  They're like, oh, this kid's Amish, and he, you know, he's out of touch with reality.
• 27:19
  We have to go through red tape after red tape after red tape, and there's zoning, and there's they go on and on and on and on.
• 27:26
  And uh for the Amish, it just doesn't work that way.
• 27:28
  It's it's as simple, literally, as build a house.
• 27:36
  If you don't have a house, you build one.
• 27:39
  If you can't build one, and he went on to expand that because he was asked about that before.
• 27:44
  If you can't build it, find somebody who can get be part of a community, ask your neighbors.
• 27:51
  That's at the Amish too.
• 27:53
  Did you ever see an Amish uh barn raising?
• 27:55
  It's so cool.
• 27:58
  I mean, they get everybody and their mother, even the little kids are slinging hammers, and they just throw this thing together like it's nothing.
• 28:09
  It's absolutely incredible.
• 28:13
  So these tiny homes, uh, you know, I'm already like I said, the wheels are spinning, and we have Amish all around us.
• 28:20
  I'm like, man, 42,000, I could almost assure that the Amish could build these houses.
• 28:26
  I'm looking at them, and they're they're they're so small and simple.
• 28:31
  The Amish could build these for probably half the cost of that.
• 28:37
  It's really, really cool.
• 28:41
  So these guys get a get a second chance at life.
• 28:45
  Brown's 13 years of real estate expertise have been essential to the development of the tiny home community.
• 28:53
  She learned of a listing for an abandoned 4.2 acre mobile park on Springfield's east side.
• 29:01
  The property wouldn't need to be rezoned for tiny home trailers, and the infrastructure and utilities were already in place.
• 29:10
  This is brilliant.
• 29:14
  The tiny homes are rolled in on wheels attached to their steel frames, qualifying them as recreational vehicles.
• 29:24
  Do you hear how smart this is?
• 29:28
  This is really well thought out.
• 29:30
  Oh, it's a mobile home.
• 29:35
  It's just a recreational vehicle.
• 29:40
  This is brilliant.
• 29:42
  The 400 square foot individual homes are fully furnished, including dishes and bedding.
• 29:48
  Residents pay 300 per month, which includes utilities.
• 29:54
  Most receive government disability checks of 725 per month to cover expenses.
• 30:00
  Expenses.
• 30:00
  They can remain in their home as long as they wish, provided they remain a good neighbor in the community.
• 30:09
  The village includes a 4,000 square foot community center where residents can hold cookouts, do laundry, and access a medical office staffed with student nurse volunteers and mental health professionals.
• 30:23
  This guy, oh my goodness.
• 30:26
  This is brilliant.
• 30:29
  Absolutely 100%.
• 30:31
  I'm telling you, the solution is right in front of our eyes.
• 30:38
  Meanwhile, Americans, they're taken to the streets protesting and marching and we want rights.
• 30:45
  We want rights.
• 30:52
  Realize how blessed we are.
• 30:54
  Just go help your neighbors.
• 30:56
  Stop turning to the government.
• 31:00
  Stop doing it.
• 31:01
  How do you fix the homeless crisis?
• 31:05
  Stop going to the government.
• 31:08
  Just do it.
• 31:09
  Just figure it out.
• 31:12
  Simplify it.
• 31:16
  Oh, we don't we don't have medical care.
• 31:19
  Oh, yeah, we do.
• 31:22
  Let's get student nurse volunteers and mental health professionals.
• 31:28
  That's that's part of it.
• 31:30
  It's built into the DNA of the 4,000 square foot community center where residents can they can cook out, they can do laundry, um, see a doctor, a nurse.
• 31:43
  This is incredible.
• 31:45
  Get counseling.
• 31:47
  It's so cool.
• 31:49
  For 300 bucks a month.
• 31:54
  Uh plans for additional villages are already underway on donated land.
• 31:58
  Eden Village 2 will house 24 residents and tiny homes.
• 32:04
  It is it's close to opening.
• 32:06
  It is open.
• 32:07
  This story is from 2021.
• 32:09
  Uh then they're working on Eden Village number three.
• 32:13
  I think that's also open.
• 32:15
  Eden Village 3 is housing up to 80 residents in duplexes.
• 32:21
  Over the next six years, again, this is written in 2021.
• 32:25
  Over the next six years, Brown, who's a realtor for Amax Real Estate, plans to have five villages across Springfield housing an estimated 200 homeless people.
• 32:38
  This is incredible.
• 32:39
  I love love of love, love everything about this.
• 32:43
  Oh, and they're not done yet.
• 32:47
  They're not done.
• 32:50
  Now they have an official headquarters called Eden Village USA.
• 32:58
  They have the model if they call it model in a box.
• 33:03
  Start your own Eden Village.
• 33:09
  Tulsa, Oklahoma, Eden Village of Tulsa Timeline.
• 33:18
  Arizona Medicaid has 2.5 million dollar grant news for Eden Villages.
• 33:30
  Richmond groundbreaking, Eden Village RVA.
• 33:38
  Philadelphia.
• 33:42
  I'm telling you, this is since 2018.
• 33:48
  Absolutely incredible.
• 33:49
  How about the success rate in the first year?
• 33:51
  In its first year, Eden Village reduced Springfield's chronic homeless population by 14%.
• 33:58
  That was just in a year at one.
• 34:03
  Cost savings.
• 34:04
  It costs the city 30 to 40,000 per year to support one chronically homeless individual.
• 34:13
  That's ER visits, jail, etc.
• 34:17
  Edom Village reduces this cost by 60 to 75%.
• 34:23
  You want to talk about saving tax dollars.
• 34:28
  How about housing stability?
• 34:30
  Nationally, housing first models like Eden Village boast an 88% decrease in returns to homelessness.
• 34:42
  100% of residents must have a documented disability and have been chronically homeless for one plus year, or four or more times in the past three years.
• 35:02
  And the box.
• 35:04
  The Eden Village in a Box package provides blueprints, zoning templates, and branding to help any city in America, any city, period.
• 35:16
  Any city can have a village up and running in roughly 24 months.
• 35:21
  I'm telling you, the solution to homelessness is right in front of our noses.
• 35:29
  It's literally them handing it on a platter.
• 35:33
  This is their version.
• 35:34
  Eden Village, Eden Village in a Box is their version of Amish dude saying, just get a hammer and build a house.
• 35:46
  People laugh at, oh yeah, naive little Amishman who grew up sheltered and doesn't have a clue how the real world works.
• 35:55
  Meanwhile, there's Eden Village in a box.
• 36:00
  Yeah, just get a hammer.
• 36:02
  Here are the blueprints.
• 36:05
  Here the zoning zoning templates.
• 36:09
  Branding, all of it.
• 36:12
  Here it is.
• 36:12
  We're literally handing it to you.
• 36:15
  You'll have a village launched and up and running in 24 months.
• 36:20
  Guys, I my mind is blown right now.
• 36:24
  My mind is absolutely blown, and I can't wait to bring this to people at my church, to people in my town.
• 36:32
  I literally just learned about this today, and I'm so pumped about this.
• 36:36
  I'm so excited.
• 36:39
  The answer is in front of our noses.
• 36:43
  This is within reach everywhere in America.
• 36:49
  There's no reason why we're not stepping into this and taking care of the homelessness.
• 36:57
  We're up on a break here.
• 36:58
  Um, all of our shows do go to podcasts the next day after the broadcast is heard on talk radio.
• 37:04
  You can hear them on Spotify, Stitcher, Pandora, iHeart Podcast, Apple Podcasts, many, many more.
• 37:10
  Be sure to subscribe, rate the show, share it, and when we come back, we'll talk more about Eden Village.
• 37:17
  Visit AmericaOutloud.news, use the code out loud for 20% off.
• 37:22
  We'll be right back.
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• 38:50
  What if I told you we could solve the homelessness in America?
• 38:56
  Now, I'm not talking about poverty.
• 38:58
  Those are two very separate things.
• 39:04
  But I'm talking about the homelessness.
• 39:11
  People out in the open, out in the streets.
• 39:14
  They can't make it.
• 39:16
  A lot of people die.
• 39:18
  A lot of people starve.
• 39:19
  There's a major drug crisis.
• 39:22
  There's an epidemic among the homeless.
• 39:25
  And there's a stigma.
• 39:26
  Let's face it, there's a stigma that's attached to people living in homelessness.
• 39:31
  And there's a mentality, and I don't like it.
• 39:35
  I'm not saying that I endorse this.
• 39:37
  I don't, but there's a mentality.
• 39:40
  Well, we pay taxes, let the government care for those people.
• 39:45
  Let the government take care of it.
• 39:48
  I'm not a fan.
• 39:49
  I've seen how the government takes care of things, and it's almost never done well.
• 39:57
  There are exceptions.
• 39:58
  There are things that the government
• 40:00
  Does do well.
• 40:02
  Give credit where credit's due.
• 40:04
  There are some things that they do exceptionally well.
• 40:08
  But caring for the homeless has not been on the list of the top 10 things that the government does well.
• 40:14
  Let's just face it.
• 40:15
  All of us know this.
• 40:17
  We're all well aware.
• 40:20
  But enter Eden Village.
• 40:25
  Eden Village was started by Linda Brown.
• 40:29
  She's a realtor in Springfield, Missouri, and she had this vision.
• 40:33
  She had this idea.
• 40:35
  She had a lot of restless nights seeing her homeless friends and knowing that they're going right back out into the cold while she gets to lay her head down on a pillow in her warm house at night.
• 40:49
  And this really bothered her.
• 40:50
  It nagged at her.
• 40:53
  And having her experience as a realtor was a brilliant solution to this problem.
• 41:01
  She understood zoning.
• 41:03
  She understood all the complexities that come with being able to create a village like this.
• 41:12
  And she started to find abandoned mobile parks, mobile home parks.
• 41:19
  They're already the infrastructure is there.
• 41:23
  You have the electric, all the utilities, gas, uh sewer, all of it's there.
• 41:31
  It's already there.
• 41:34
  So her idea was let's remove these run-down trailers, and let's turn it into a beautiful tiny home village.
• 41:47
  And that's exactly what she did.
• 41:49
  She began with a listing for an abandoned 4.2 acre mobile park on the east side of Springfield.
• 41:57
  Now Springfield has, I think there are four Eden villages.
• 42:02
  And now there's Eden Village USA.
• 42:07
  It's now a national brand.
• 42:10
  And cities and towns all across America are stepping in and they're doing this.
• 42:17
  They're creating these villages.
• 42:20
  So again, some of the statistics, uh, in the first year, Eden Village reduced Springfield's chronic homeless population by 14%.
• 42:33
  It's a major cost savings to taxpayers.
• 42:37
  It costs the city 30 to 40,000 per year to support one chronically homeless individual between uh emergency room visits, jail, those sorts of things.
• 42:51
  It's it's a major cost to society.
• 42:54
  Eden Village reduces that cost by 60 to 75%.
• 43:01
  Housing first models like Eden Village boast an 88% decrease in returns to homelessness.
• 43:08
  And that's one of the problems.
• 43:10
  I've I've talked about this plenty of times because I've experienced this, where there's generational homelessness, and I've been so frustrated working with homeless people who we get everything lined up.
• 43:24
  Literally, essentially all they have to do is grab a hold of the key, turn it, and walk into the place, and they manage to burn those bridges.
• 43:36
  And part of that is is, of course, on the individual and that culture, but part of that also is on not having a good network.
• 43:47
  You know, when you have one or two or three people trying to work with one individual, and you multiply that by, you know, in a town like ours, you multiply that by a hundred or so.
• 44:05
  You get exasperated very quickly.
• 44:09
  You run out of steam, you run out of time, you run out of money.
• 44:15
  It's just a major issue.
• 44:19
  So this model actually works, and it works really well.
• 44:25
  Eden Village in a box, it's a package that provides the actual blueprints, zoning templates, branding to help any city in America launch a village in 24 months.
• 44:39
  That's incredible.
• 44:42
  I mean, this ought to be on, this ought to be running on the TV.
• 44:45
  Every politician ought to be talking about this.
• 44:48
  Instead, it's ah, the oligarchy, you know, it's the Bernie Sanders with his oligarchy tour and all this nonsense.
• 44:55
  Just blowing a whole bunch of smoke, trying to get re-elected until they're 107 years old.
• 45:03
  Poor Mitch uh Mitch McConnell looks like he's uh knocking on death's door.
• 45:12
  Some of these people are just they're rough looking.
• 45:17
  Nancy Pelosi, that's just look at these guys.
• 45:22
  Maybe they ought to retire, and the politicians ought to just say, you know what, we suck at doing most of our jobs.
• 45:31
  And people like Linda Brown ought to be highlighted.
• 45:36
  We ought to give them credit.
• 45:37
  We ought to praise them.
• 45:39
  And you guys just turn to them from now on, and you guys figure it out because you guys do such a good job at it.
• 45:45
  Like, I would love to hear an honest politician.
• 45:50
  And then just say, you guys take the reins.
• 45:52
  We'll support you in whatever capacity we can, but you guys just take this and run.
• 46:00
  It's really cool.
• 46:01
  So uh the model works.
• 46:03
  Here, here's the reason why it works really well.
• 46:07
  It's permanent housing, not transitional.
• 46:13
  Residents sign a lease.
• 46:16
  They pay about $325 a month.
• 46:20
  And this is usually by means of social security, SSI and disability, right?
• 46:27
  It's not a shelter.
• 46:29
  It's their forever home.
• 46:31
  It's a permanent home.
• 46:34
  Uh there's high-tech security.
• 46:37
  Communities are gated.
• 46:38
  Eden villages are gated with biometric entry fingerprint.
• 46:45
  That ensures a sense of safety for individuals who've spent years in high trauma environments.
• 46:52
  That's really important for the mental well-being of the people in these villages.
• 46:58
  Excuse me.
• 47:01
  Community as their medicine.
• 47:04
  The community center is vital.
• 47:07
  It's the heartbeat of the village.
• 47:13
  It offers everything from woodworking shops to gardens to on-site psychiatric nurses, case managers.
• 47:22
  This is brilliant.
• 47:25
  And the restoration farm in 2026, just this year, the Springfield headquarters.
• 47:36
  It launched or uh highlighted a barn and working farm where residents grow produce for the local community, shifting their identity from burden to provider.
• 47:49
  My goodness, this is brilliant.
• 47:53
  Linda is a genius.
• 47:57
  A literal genius.
• 48:01
  This is so cool.
• 48:05
  And Eden Villages are cropping up all over America and with good reason.
• 48:12
  So again, it began, Eden Village began.
• 48:15
  It was founded by Nate and Linda through their nonprofit the gathering tree.
• 48:23
  Nate and Linda had the gathering tree.
• 48:27
  I didn't really look into the gathering tree to see what it was.
• 48:31
  But after years of running this drop-in center, they realized that providing temporary aid.
• 48:40
  You know, the food, the showers, the laundry, laundry, the laundromat kind of thing.
• 48:46
  That didn't solve the root cause.
• 48:49
  So Eden Village one opened in August of 2018.
• 48:54
  That was the mobile home park that was uh abandoned, kind of retrofitted with these small homes, which are not according to zoning, they're not permanent, they're recreational vehicles, which is really cool.
• 49:13
  And their goal was to make Springfield a city where hashtag no one sleeps outside.
• 49:21
  Springfield now serves as the national headquarters, and it's expanded to three distinct villages.
• 49:29
  Villages one, two, and three, Eden Village One, Eden Village Two, Eden Village number three, and it houses about a hundred residents in total.
• 49:41
  They began the national footprint.
• 49:45
  This model was now replicated via Eden Village in a box.
• 49:51
  It's the licensing and toolkit package that anybody has access to.
• 49:56
  You don't have to be a high powerful
• 50:00
  Oligarchy to get a hold of these blueprints.
• 50:06
  That's the brilliance.
• 50:10
  You don't have to go to your local officials.
• 50:12
  You don't have to go to state officials.
• 50:13
  You don't have to crawl on your hands and knees and beg politicians for the next 19 years to get permission to do this or funding.
• 50:25
  It literally gives you the blueprints, and I'm excited to open these up.
• 50:29
  And uh, you know, I'm certainly, certainly gonna look into this.
• 50:34
  It's it's incredible.
• 50:35
  You know what's interesting about this, and I believe that everything happens for a reason, right?
• 50:41
  Everything happens for a reason.
• 50:43
  I've envisioned these tiny home villages for homeless people for years now.
• 50:52
  And I've searched and you know, I haven't searched real hard, but uh it's always been in the back of my mind, and I'm like, man, it'd be so cool to have a tiny home village, kind of like uh RV parks, and that's I I own a motor home, and it's they're big money pits.
• 51:10
  I don't recommend them unless you just have a lot of money that you can just set fire to.
• 51:17
  But we love traveling in our in our in our camper in our motor home.
• 51:26
  It's a lot of fun.
• 51:28
  We've made a lot of memories, but I love going to campgrounds because there's just a certain atmosphere that you can't really explain to people.
• 51:35
  You just kind of have to go to them to get a feel for it.
• 51:39
  But there's a sense of belonging, there's an instant sense of community.
• 51:43
  Uh there's like a unique aspect to wheeling into one of these uh campgrounds.
• 51:54
  It's like we're all doing the same thing, we all have the same interest.
• 51:59
  Uh, neighbors will walk over and offer you food or invite you to to their cookout, and you just kind of walk around and talk to people and ask people where they're from, and it's like it's just really cool.
• 52:12
  A lot of campgrounds will have some kind of a community center.
• 52:16
  A lot don't, but but a lot do.
• 52:20
  Just depends on where you go and how it's set up.
• 52:24
  But I've been to ones with like these little community centers in in the center of the camp, and it's just really cool.
• 52:30
  Like they'll play bluegrass music and they'll host movie nights and give free popcorn and you know, every night there's something a little different, and it's just it's built for the residents for the guests.
• 52:47
  And uh, so I I get this.
• 52:49
  I love I love this kind of culture.
• 52:53
  Having the community center in the center of these parks is really important.
• 53:02
  They don't call them parks, they call them communities, villages, but it's just brilliant.
• 53:09
  So again, Eden Village in a in a box, it's the licensing toolkit package that keeps uh keeps current and uh helps people to develop an entire village in 24 months.
• 53:27
  Springfield, Missouri, there are three active villages there, also home of the restoration farm, which opened in late 2025.
• 53:36
  I mean, early 2026, it just opened up.
• 53:41
  It provides jobs and dignity for residents.
• 53:45
  Tulsa, Oklahoma, it's one of the largest sites.
• 53:49
  They have 63 homes on 17 acres, featuring a 4,000 square foot community center.
• 53:58
  Wellmington, North Carolina.
• 54:02
  This is uh one of the early expansion sites for Eden Villages, very successful.
• 54:08
  Phoenix, uh, the Phoenix Mesa, Arizona broke ground with a massive 2.5 million dollar grant from Arizona Medicaid Health Plans.
• 54:23
  See, government does have, they do have a purpose, and they can help.
• 54:28
  I'm not saying government's worthless, but they're not the ones that at that at the uh at the reins here.
• 54:34
  They're helping provide funding.
• 54:36
  I I think it's incredible.
• 54:37
  Yeah, if you can partner with government, go ahead and do it.
• 54:41
  If you have the right connections, by all means green light that baby.
• 54:45
  Richmond, Virginia, Eden Village RVA, currently under development from a former Heliport site.
• 54:56
  They'll be completed in 2027.
• 55:00
  Harrisburg, PA, Kansas City, Kansas, Louisville, Kentucky, another one in Missouri, uh all over the place.
• 55:10
  You get the idea.
• 55:11
  This is expanding and expanding quickly.
• 55:14
  This thing just launched in 2018.
• 55:18
  This is only eight years old.
• 55:20
  This the whole concept is only eight years old.
• 55:25
  And look at where it's at.
• 55:29
  Folks, this is why I love America.
• 55:32
  What other nation in the world can you do this kind of stuff with this level of success?
• 55:39
  This is fantastic news.
• 55:41
  This is great news.
• 55:42
  Don't listen to all the naysayers out there who talk about how America's doomed and America sucks and all that stuff.
• 55:49
  Don't listen to them.
• 55:51
  America is the greatest nation on planet Earth, and there's so much good that's happening.
• 55:58
  It's it's unreal.
• 56:00
  I'm at a loss for words at how special this is.
• 56:05
  And that, my friends, is the hidden lightness.
• 56:08
  Take this to your community, check it out, uh, visit the links that that I'll post in the show notes, and I hope this motivates somebody in the audience to do this.
• 56:18
  If we get one person who gets excited about this idea, I think that's a win.
• 56:25
  It's just a win.
• 56:26
  God is gonna bless it.
• 56:28
  You can find more out about my show and get all the latest podcasts if you go to the menu navigation bar at America Outloud.news under our shows or schedule.
• 56:35
  You'll be in the know.
• 56:36
  There is a hidden lightness that shines inside of all of us.
• 56:38
  When there's so much darkness that envelops the world, remember it doesn't take much light to expose that darkness and to ultimately inspire other people.
• 56:46
  Join me in being a light.