AMP Top Ten: Errin Stanger, No Place Like Home

Describing Errin Stanger as an accomplished person is an understatement, given her successful career with the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub in North Little Rock and as a serial volunteer with organizations such as the Argenta Contemporary Theatre in North Little Rock, Make-A-Wish Mid-South in Little Rock, Arkansas Children’s and Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure, to name a few.

To that list of accomplishments, one can now add “developer” as the inspiration and drive behind Providence Park in Little Rock, a first-in-Arkansas village designed to help people experiencing homelessness get on their feet and move their life in a positive direction.

“Throughout my life, I’ve always sought out opportunities to try and serve,” said the Little Rock native and Mount St. Mary Academy graduate, “but God’s plan is always bigger.”

Stanger’s professional life led her to the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub in North Little Rock, where she steadily worked her way into the role of director in 2021. Coming to work every day, she passed homeless people, and it began to tug at her brain what could be done to help them in a lasting way. The tug grew stronger as she researched the issue of homelessness, an issue that soon consumed virtually all of her free time.

“I really started to become much more in tune, after studying this issue for a while, with what existed here, what is the landscape like and, also, what didn’t exist,” Stanger said. “The search was to find something that provided long-term care opportunities. I was focusing on the chronically homeless.”

Through her research, she eventually stumbled across Community First! Village in Austin, Texas, an organization founded by Alan Graham, who had been on a mission to serve the homeless for a quarter century. Community First! Village, a 51-acre master-planned community that provides permanent housing for people who are chronically homeless, was the culmination of that lifelong work. Upon seeing it, Stanger was enthralled.

“I knew the minute I got out of my car, I was somewhere special,” Stanger said.

Determined to replicate the concept in Little Rock, Stanger began to drum up support for what ultimately manifested as Providence Park, a neighborhood of tiny homes on a 50-acre lot off of Chicot Road.

Stanger noted there will ultimately be three sizes of homes available: micro, micro-plus and a park home, from smallest to largest. Each floor plan varies in layout and amenities. The micro-plus and park models offer plumbing, while residents in the micro model access shared bathroom, kitchen and laundry facilities. Each home comes with a porch, encouraging conversations with neighbors in the fresh air.

The village will ultimately feature wrap-around care via an on-site medical clinic featuring a trained medical staff that will focus on physical, mental and dental health. A fabrication lab and an art hub are planned, allowing neighbors to build things and learn crafts and trades to earn money.

“We want to be able to provide the work opportunities on-site because these individuals have been through so much trauma that they might not be able to handle a basic job,” Stanger said. “They’ve just been through too much.”

Harmony Hall, the 11,750-square-foot community center, will host events and feature a convenience store — Nilu’s Nook — as well as a gift shop where neighbors will sell what they have created. There are also plans to add a garden later on for neighbors to tend and harvest produce, which could help rebuild the residents’ relationship with food.

Stanger hopes to one day have completed 400 homes on the property, changing 400 lives forever. As evidenced by the cooperation she has found working with city and county offices, the idea is a welcomed one that could help individuals regain dignity and sufficiency in a place that is their permanent home at last.

“For our residents, it’s really about becoming whole again, but the impact of this work and what we’re actually doing in the community we’re serving, I mean, it impacts all of us,” she said. “It’s thrilling to see what God has been doing. He’s just opened so many doors that have made it possible for this dream to come alive. I’m so excited about the future of this.”