Officials with the Iowa Finance Authority say the IFA’ Board of Directors recently awarded $824,655 in grants to twenty-five organizations to assist homeless and domestic violence shelters with costs associated with providing essential services and emergency shelter operations. The funding is made available through the Shelter Assistance Fund program. Among the projects awarded Shelter Assistance Funds, was New Visions Homeless Services, in Council Bluffs, which received $37,500.

Shelter Assistance Fund applications are accepted on an annual basis and are judged through a competitive process. The Iowa Finance Authority received 28 eligible applications for the 2015 round requesting more than $1.2 million in funding. The program is funded with proceeds from the Real Estate Transfer Tax.

A panel of judges scored the applications based on criteria in several categories, including: project design and competition priorities, experience and capacity, community partnerships, performance, budget and grants management.

The Iowa Council on Homelessness reports that 18,810 Iowans experienced homelessness in 2013 and a total of 11,811 were served by a shelter.