Alton Nonprofit Renews Focus on Homelessness Services and Housing Stability
ALTON - A local group known as Greater Alton Community Development Corporation has announced a new name and renewed focus on building up the Alton community.
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Now known as Brick Town, the organization oversees the Overnight Warming Locations (OWLs) and aims to promote housing and neighborhood stability, resident engagement, and leadership development while coordinating homelessness services. Executive Director Megan Armentrout-Steward and OWL Development Director Martha Pfister explained more about what this means for the community going forward.
“We believe that everyone should have access to a safe community, an affordable home, to be able to stay in the home that they love,” Armentrout-Steward said. “We know that people who have safe and secure housing are going to be able to do a lot more.”
Brick Town is specifically interested in the Hunterstown neighborhood of Alton, which includes Deliverance Temple, the Scott Bibb Center, and other landmarks. The organization has three committees that will oversee different aspects of its projects.
The Homeless Service Coordination committee manages the OWLs, which is not a nonprofit but “more a movement of volunteers,” Armentrout-Steward said. Headed by the OWLs’ new executive director, Isaac Sandidge, this work helps people experiencing homelessness and builds collaboration between services.
The Resident Engagement & Leadership Development committee will promote leadership training and help residents connect to solve issues. Armentrout-Steward noted that communities are stronger when people come together to effect change.
“We’re really wanting to create a neighborhood association to provide technical assistance and promote leadership training within that Hunterstown neighborhood,” she explained. “When residents want to actually address things in their community, it can be hard to be one lone person showing up to something like a city council meeting or trying to reach your alderperson. But when you have a community around you of neighbors who are seeing the same issues and want to do something about it, that is really going to speak louder to electives and to the people who have the ability to do that change.”
The Housing & Neighborhood Stability part of the Brick Town plan aims to address vacancy and property maintenance by offering home repair support and other resources. By Spring 2027, the organization hopes to have a tool-lending library that people can utilize for home maintenance projects.
“We know what happens when a community continues to see vacant properties pop up in their neighborhood,” Armentrout-Steward said. “We just see an increased disinvestment and a snowball effect. We believe that everybody should have access to a safe neighborhood and a stable home, so that’s what that committee is looking at.”
Armentrout-Steward and Pfister agreed they don’t want Alton to lose homes, both because of the historic value of these houses and because people are presently “suffering” and deserve to have “a better future” with support. They are concerned about street homelessness as well as people facing eviction and being priced out of their neighborhoods.
Brick Town aims to address some of these concerns by “building social equity” and promoting affordable housing. Pfister noted that, as a community development corporation, Brick Town has a unique model that empowers people to join their work.
“One of the primary aspects of a CDC is that their board governance is really made up of people from the neighborhood,” she said. “There are requirements and goals of having people in the neighborhood or with businesses in the neighborhood being the ones governing the board. Being a CDC brings in a lot of things like that. We work alongside the government, but as an independent private nonprofit organization, and with that focus on the people who live in that neighborhood.”
As Brick Town establishes its new name, logo and goals, Armentrout-Steward and Pfister hope they can “reinvigorate” with a focus on the Hunterstown neighborhood. For more information about Brick Town, visit their official website.
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