DAVID A. PAP
Helping households
A homeless person or someone who is at risk of becoming homeless in Cambridge can get assistance to find an apartment and pay their monthly rent through several agencies. But many are still confronted with at least one other barrier: saving enough money for a security deposit and other fees associated with renting a new apartment.
That’s where the Cambridge Community of Realtors can help. The organization, along with a coalition of local banks and businesses, raises money for the Cambridge Housing Assistance Fund through an annual benefit concert.
The fund, which celebrates its fifth anniversary this year, has raised more than $440,000 to help hundreds of homeless households and those in danger of becoming homeless pay the startup costs of moving into a new apartment.
“Often the last barrier for people moving out of homelessness is the upfront costs. Sometimes it can be $2,000 or $3,000 with the first and last [month’s rent] and security [deposit],” said Linda Wood-Boyle, executive director of HomeStart, a nonprofit group with offices in Boston and Cambridge that helps the homeless. “These funds break down that last barrier.”
HomeStart receives the money collected by CHAF and then administers it to those in need. “We’re helping well over 100 households every year,” said CHAF Director David A. Pap, a senior sales associate with Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Cambridge.
For 11 years, the Cambridge Community of Realtors has organized a holiday party and raised money for Our Place, a Salvation Army daycare center for the children of homeless people. This year the group contributed $35,000 to Our Place. But recognizing that escalating home prices and rents are driving many people out of the Cambridge housing market, the Realtor group sought other ways to help those in need of housing.
Pap, along with Realtors Ilona Kuphal and Paul Turcotte, decided to start the fund in 1999. Originally, the group wanted to raise money to help families purchasing homes in Cambridge with their down payment costs. But with plenty of flexible mortgage programs helping lower-income households to become homeowners already in existence, the Realtor group was asked by community leaders to help in another way.
Starting CHAF
The Realtors eventually discovered a way to help after attending a Cambridge Fair Housing Commission meeting. Pap, who attended the meeting with Kuphal, said a woman who worked for a private nonprofit group that provides services to homeless people in Cambridge said that while homeless people received counseling on paying their bills and improving their credit, they had very little help when it came to paying for security deposits, moving expenses, and first-month’s rent.
That essentially encourage Pap and Kuphal to start CHAF. During the first year, the Realtors decided to hold a benefit concert and Harvard University agreed to let them use Sanders Theatre for free.
Their next step was to secure donations. Dick DeWolfe, leader of the former The DeWolfe Cos., was the first contributor, donating $5,000. (At the time, both Kuphal and Pap worked for The DeWolfe Cos.) That spurred companies such as Coldwell Banker and Hammond/GMAC Residential Real Estate to kick in with their own donations.
The Realtors also sought donations from local banks. Cambridgeport Bank, Cambridge Trust Co., Cambridge Savings Bank and East Cambridge Savings Bank all contributed, bringing in thousands dollars before the concert.
“We had this coalition of banks and Realtors we had $35,000 already,” said Pap. The event, which was chaired by Cambridge Trust, eventually raised $100,000.
“It’s wonderful that these four banks have embraced this [CHAF],” said Turcotte, the owner of Re/Max Destiny and president of the Cambridge Community of Realtors.
The Cambridge Community of Realtors, formed at least 15 years ago, was once a council of the Greater Boston Real Estate Board. About two years ago, GBREB decided to dissolve its local councils.
At the time, the Cambridge council was one of the few that were active and the Realtors wanted to preserve the group. Today, the group, which is no longer a GBREB division, meets for monthly luncheons, and focuses on raising money for Our Place and CHAF.
This year’s benefit concert will feature five-time Grammy nominee and Cambridge native Nnenna Freelon. The concert will take place Oct. 3 at 8 p.m. at the Sanders Theatre. Since the local banks rotate chairing the concert, this year’s chairmen will be James F. Dwinell III and Joseph V. Roller II, who are, respectively, chairman/chief executive officer and president of Cambridge Trust. Their goal is to raise $150,000.
Citizens Bank, which is in the process of acquiring Cambridgeport Bank, has already committed $20,000 and Cambridge Trust is donating $15,000 for the benefit, according to Pap.
Last year’s concert, which raised about $131,000, was particularly successful. It was the first time that the CHAF raised or exceeded its fund-raising goal, according to Pap. The 2002 concert was chaired by Cambridgeport Bank President James Keegan with the assistance of bank vice president Teddy Arvanites.
“We saw this [coalition] as a model that could be important to other communities,” said Pap. In fact, a group of Boston Realtors including Kuphal – one of the founders of CHAF – followed the Cambridge Realtors’ lead and recently started organizing an annual cocktail party and silent auction. The Realtors give the auction proceeds to HomeStart.
Concert tickets are $23 and $28 and are available at the Harvard box office in Harvard Square or by calling (617) 496-2222.
