TAMPA — The Department of Housing and Urban Development has awarded the Tampa Hillsborough Homeless Initiative $8,000,195 – which renews funding for 12 of their current projects.

Some of that money will fund an affordable housing project for veterans in Tampa.

“This project is to house 36 previously homeless, disabled veterans,” said Tampa Hillsborough Homeless Initiative CEO Antoinette Hayes-Triplett.

Triplett has been with the agency for almost nine years and says the need is greater now than it was when she first started.

“We’ve seen a large increase over the last four years of people that are 62, and older and they are asking for services related to homelessness,” she said.

For the last eight months, the initiative has been rehabbing a property in the University Mall area with the help of Housing First Steps Forward. 

The units will be fully furnished and will come online in June.

“The veterans can just come in,” said Triplett. “We work with other community partners to provide food. We have about 200 homeless veterans in Hillsborough County, so this will put a significant dent in that number.”

It’s a community that Triplett is passionate about serving because she’s also a veteran.

“I didn’t expect to go into the military,” she said.  “My brother is a (Marine) veteran. I think I have six or seven cousins that are veterans. My father was a veteran.”

After six years of active duty with the U.S. Air Force, she says she was set to become an officer.

However, an accident ended her military career.

“I was in a car accident and rear-ended by a drunk driver and it should have ended my life,” she said.  “The drunk driver later hit two people and killed them.”

Triplett says she still struggles with injuries from that crash that happened more than 20 years ago.

Because of her past experiences, she says she’s grown into the person she wanted to be.

“It changed the trajectory of my life,” she sad. “This is what I was meant to do and I look at that accident as steering me in the right direction. I’ve been through a lot as a veteran that has helped me over the last 25 years of doing this work.”

By being at the forefront to end housing insecurity for veterans, Triplett says she’s found another path in service to her community.

Tampa Hillsborough Homeless Initiative recently completed a Homeless Census for Tampa and Hillsborough County.

After their last count in February 2022,  they reported more than 1,500 people were without shelter.

Triplett says their new data is scheduled for release next month and will reflect an increase in homelessness of more than 10%.