Representatives of six community support organizations gathered around a large meeting table on Tuesday, Sept. 8, to see their collective effort to address homelessness in Licking County come into focus.
With funding from the Licking County Foundation, five social service agencies recently hired housing navigators who have either begun or are continuing their full-time work to remove barriers and find permanent housing for those in need.
The navigators are trained to help individuals and families access housing resources, complete residence applications, connect with community resources and maintain housing once obtained. Navigators meet clients experiencing homelessness through street outreach, existing basic-needs services and word of mouth.
The navigator program was announced in March 2026, and the five positions are employed by Licking County Coalition of Care, Newark Homeless Outreach, Licking County Coalition for Housing, St. Vincent de Paul Housing Facilities and The Main Place.
“Licking County has always been rich with resources, but oftentimes we’ve operated in a siloed thought process: ‘This is my area. This is your area,’” said Bobby Persinger, Licking County Foundation program officer. “Now, through this process, it’s a much more intertwined, woven system that is going to enhance the whole process.”
Persinger said the foundation is investing $1.8 million over the next five years into the navigator positions. The money is designed to sustain the navigators, with the intention of creating permanent roles in their respective organizations.
Some of the navigators, such as Trish Perry, co-founder of the harm reduction advocacy group OhioCAN and Newark Homeless Outreach, have been doing outreach work for years, on top of a full-time job. The designated roles now allow agencies to reduce the workload by delegating tasks to others in their network.
“I’ve been navigating at the Outreach for eight and a half years, because we have people come every week looking for housing, looking for, you know, food, looking for a stable place to stay,” Perry said. “So this is great, because now all the resources…So it’s amazing, in the last four to six weeks, that we’ve been doing this.”
Previously, the organizations had worked separately across Licking County, but the new positions have changed that. Coalition of Housing Navigator Kayla Cummings said she connected a veteran experiencing homelessness with housing resources after Perry messaged her.
“He was homeless and needed services, had nowhere to go, so we were able to connect him,” Cummings said. “So even though Trish was working with him, she was able to reach out to me and say: ‘Hey, I remember you mentioned veterans. Do you guys have a veterans program?’ So I was able to connect her with somebody from there.”
In one week, the two navigators worked together to help their client find temporary housing in a hotel, receive a cellphone and schedule doctor’s appointments.
Navigators have clients fill out a form with very simple details: name, where you are staying, contact information and space for any additional notes. The form allows navigators to tailor care for clients who may need multiple resources for stabilization, such as substance-use recovery, mental health services or acquiring identity documents. In the first few weeks the network has been active, each navigator has had roughly 10 individuals in their caseload.
However, Coalition of Care navigator Ken Quick said the roles have to build trust with a population that has been ignored and devalued repeatedly.
“Over my career as a nurse, I see many times that we, in the healthcare industry, just expect people to go learn on their own, and I think that’s what this group does is replace that piece, and actually helps guide people to have some interest in their care: ‘that I can get back into whatever I want to do in life.’ And so I see that is what this does,” Quick said.
Trust appears to be building.
According to The Main Place Navigator Cassie Aller, she has spoken with people who are homeless in Licking County who are seeking her out to connect with services. And even when they receive housing, Aller is focused on helping people maintain their living situation.
“You’re taking them off the street and putting them in a house, and it’s so hard for them to just know how to pay a bill or take care of any normal daily tasks,” Aller said. “So I want to keep in contact with them and teach them life skills and teach them how to do those things. So when a year comes up in their voucher or during the program, they don’t lose their place, because that’s what’s happening.”
Nothing about this model is formulaic, said St. Vincent Haven Navigator Ben Shirley, because it is defined by the flexible and ever-changing challenges faced by people experiencing homelessness. He said the navigators get to build their roles as they go, relying heavily on their own lived experiences.
“You can’t save the world, and as I was told, when I was brand new in recovery, you got to bring something to the table,” Shirley said. “But when you’re at your lowest, and you feel worse, and you can’t possibly be saved – you need that little spark. And, hopefully, we can bring that into someone or show that, or they catch fire, just briefly, and just maybe that’s all you need.”
Editor’s note: The Licking County Foundation provides philanthropic funding to The Reporting Project. Under our editorial policy, all content is determined solely by our newsroom.
Tyler K. Thompson writes for TheReportingProject.org, the nonprofit news organization of Denison University’s Journalism program, which is supported by generous donations from readers. Sign up for The Reporting Project newsletter here.
Thompson is one of two Kirtley Mather Fellows at The Reporting Project. The fellowship is created in memory of Kirtley Mather, Denison Class of 1909, with the mission of providing unique opportunities for students to engage in service for the common good.