Six families now call Karwick Village home. The boxes are unpacked, the keys are turned, and Phase I is now complete. That alone is worth pausing to recognize, because building affordable housing takes years of planning, partnership, and unwavering persistence.
What makes a neighborhood feel like home? Is it the borrowed cup of sugar, the cute dog who lives next door, the simple wave when passing by, or the neighbor who notices when something “is off” and checks in?
That is what the Karwick Village Community Center is being built to foster: the community and the heart of Karwick Village.
More Than a Building & Why Now
The Community Center is where residents will share laundry facilities, host cooperative meetings, gather for meals, and find learning and support opportunities right where they live. It is the room where a mother can fold clothes while her neighbor watches the baby for ten minutes. It is where residents will sit together to make decisions about the place they share through the cooperative. It is where a tutor can meet an adult student after work, and where a birthday party can fill the air with music and laughter.
In other words, it is where the village comes together.
One Karwick Village resident put it simply: “I’m excited for a place where we can connect and support each other.”
Without a shared space to hold co-op meetings and the other benefits this building provides, the residents are there, but the space to grow as a community is not. This building supports this cooperative in becoming a community with shared rhythms, shared responsibilities, and shared celebrations.
The Campaign
Homeward Bound Villages is raising $120,000 to complete the Karwick Village Community Center.
We have been so incredibly grateful for the support of the 1st Source Foundation, which provided a generous $15,000 gift to kick off this fundraiser. This sponsorship gift has supercharged our fundraising efforts.
Additional sponsors include Mr. John Vander Wagen III, as a Foundation Sponsor, who has generously donated to move this project forward. Two Framing Sponsors have also made an impact as we kick off this fundraiser: the La Porte County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office and Sandi Keller, both of whom have made sizable contributions to this effort.
$35,000 has already been raised as of this writing, and it will all help us unlock matching support to help carry the campaign across the finish line. This is a strong start to raising the vital funds needed for this project.
We invite our community, both individuals and organizations, to join us in sponsorship to complete Phase 2 of Karwick Village. There are four sponsorship levels – through dollars or equivalent gift-in-kind donations:
- The Foundation Sponsor at $10,000 supports the building’s structural construction.
- The Framing Sponsor at $5,000 supports interior construction and shared spaces.
- The Systems Sponsor at $2,500 supports the systems that keep the building running.
- The Finishing Sponsor, at $1,000, helps furnish and equip the space that residents will use.
Sponsorships can also be fulfilled through in-kind contributions of materials, services, or labor. Contractors, suppliers, tradespeople, and local businesses with goods to contribute have a real opportunity to leave a permanent mark on this project.
If you have followed Homeward Bound Villages since the early days, you already know that cooperative, forever-affordable communities are exceptionally rare in Northwest Indiana. Six families housed means six lives grounded in greater stability, connection, and opportunity. Completing the Community Center is what transforms housing into a true community and ensures those stories continue to grow for years to come.
Become a sponsor, make a gift, or share this campaign with someone who builds, supplies, or believes in this kind of work.
Karwick Village is more than housing. With your help, it becomes the place where stability, connection, and opportunity grow together.
Or just take a look at our progress on the campaign to build the community center!
You do not have to sponsor a full level to become part of this story. Every contribution helps create a lasting community asset for current and future residents of Karwick Village. You can contact us at info@homewardboundvillages.org.
