Say the furnace in your 1950s house dies in January, the same month the roof starts leaking, and your budget is already stretched thin by grocery prices. Now say you’re a landlord trying to fix those things without pushing rent out of reach for the family living there. That’s the squeeze a lot of southeast Fort Wayne is feeling, and it’s the one a new $75,000 award is aimed at.
3Rivers Credit Union and FHLBank Indianapolis are putting that money toward Bridge of Grace Ministries. It breaks down as a $60,000 Community Multiplier Member Match Grant from FHLBank Indianapolis plus a $15,000 match from 3Rivers. Bridge of Grace will use it to renovate four aging homes in the Mount Vernon Park neighborhood, covering structural repairs, updated mechanical systems, and other work needed to make the houses safe and ready for local families.
3Rivers President and CEO Don Cates framed it as a maintenance problem as much as a supply problem. “Housing is a gap in the community—affordable housing even more so,” he said. “When you have a house, even if you own it, sometimes it’s hard to keep up with maintenance as inflation and prices rise. Anytime we can provide funding that helps lower that cost and burden—whether through rent or improvements to a home—it helps raise the tide for the whole community. Bridge of Grace is a great example of that.”
The group has a track record to back that up. Bridge of Grace has been renovating homes in Mount Vernon Park since 2016 and has finished more than 40 of them. Grants, private donations, and volunteer labor cover the work, which is how the organization keeps rents affordable.
The houses are one piece of a bigger effort called H.O.P.E., short for Housing, Opportunity, Progress, and Education. Families connected with Bridge of Grace can tap into everything from early childhood education and mentoring to financial coaching and community support.
Interim CEO Martin Pastura says that breadth is the point. “Bridge of Grace is really a community development organization,” he said. “We work a lot with kids and have a childcare center, a health center, and a housing program—all of that plays into making the community better. This funding will go toward rehabbing four older homes to make them better, stronger, and more environmentally safe.”
The money comes through the Community Multiplier Member Match Program, which lets FHLBank Indianapolis member financial institutions back nonprofits that preserve and expand affordable housing in Indiana and Michigan. Representatives from 3Rivers, FHLBank Indianapolis, and Bridge of Grace gathered at the 3Rivers Northland Branch in Fort Wayne on Friday, October 23, to mark the award.
Four houses won’t solve a housing shortage, but for four families, a sound roof and a working furnace will matter a great deal.