Woman Gets Off Welfare, Into A Home Program Helps With Down Payment On A New Life

Five years ago, homeless was a word more familiar to Tami Cochran than homeowner.

On Saturday, Cochran, a single mother from Post Falls, will collect a check for the down payment on a home and become free from welfare’s grip.

Cochran is the first graduate of an Idaho Housing and Finance Association pilot program aimed at making welfare recipients self-reliant.

The IHFA will recognize Cochran today during the Community Resource Fair at the Silver Lake Mall.

“I never thought the idea of owning a home was anywhere in the future,” Cochran said. “Without this program, that would still be a dream.”

The Family Self-Sufficiency Program puts a portion of participants’ rent payments into an escrow account. After completing the program and living 12 months without federal or state assistance, participants receive the cash.

More than 100 Idahoans are in the program and 300 more people are on a waiting list.

But for Cochran, it’s more than simply getting off welfare.

“The major thing is my self-esteem,” said Cochran, who started receiving welfare in 1993 after leaving a turbulent marriage.

“I didn’t like being on welfare,” she said. “I wanted to be able to support my family. I wanted to teach my kids you need to earn your own way.”

After completing a six-week computer class at North Idaho College, Cochran was able to quit her low-paying job as a hairstylist. Eight months later, she was off welfare.

Cochran now works at Johnson-Matthey, a Spokane electronics plant, and has stability for the first time in her life.

“I was never much of a goal-setter in my younger years,” Cochran said. “This is my first major goal.”

Goal No. 2 is to own a home.

Nancy Stolberg, the program’s coordinator, said 98 percent of the participants are setting aside money to be used for home down payments.

The Family Self-Sufficiency Program is part of Idaho’s welfare reform efforts. And Stolberg said the results are encouraging.

“It’s not just about becoming free of federal and state welfare,” she said. “But free from federal and state welfare for the rest of their life.”