Frequently Asked Questions

For many, it takes more than housing to overcome years of homelessness. Lasting healing and change require immersing oneself in a new community, overcoming unhealthy habits used to cope with stress on the streets, gaining new problem-solving skills, and developing habits that help achieve one’s potential. Some have misinterpreted “Housing First” research to mean the provision of housing with no expectations.
We believe that the same conditions that lead to a fulfilling life for the rest of the world apply to the chronically homeless as well. We all need social support, meaningful work, safety, peers who hold us accountable to healthy norms and a sense of purpose in order to thrive. Few people would ever achieve their potential if they weren’t embedded in a community that expected something of them. The Other Side Village is simply a healthy community that helps people learn to live in a healthy community.
Safe and beautiful housing is a necessary but insufficient ingredient to lasting change.

The Other Side Village was founded by the same leaders who built The Other Side Academy. While the Academy serves many who have been homeless as well, the Village will also include those with mental and other health challenges–people who are not served by the Academy. Both communities share the core governing philosophy that people heal and thrive through community and connection.
The two organizations are legally and operationally separate. While students of The Other Side Academy made the first $50,000 donation to help fund the Village, the finances of the two organizations are kept entirely separate as well.
Also, while the same Therapeutic Community principles will be used in the Village, the way they are implemented is adapted to the unique needs of the populations they serve.

It is not about “tiny homes.” Some communities have built tiny home neighborhoods that became tiny slums in short order. The most important part of The Other Side Village is the culture. It is a community with strong social norms that are maintained by the neighbors themselves. This culture facilitates connection, invites personal growth, and maintains a safe and beautiful community. Positive social norms are what brings out the best in all of us. The Villages norms, based on our shared beliefs, invite all to strive to achieve their potential, allowing them the dignity of being part of the solution, not just a problem to be solved. Work and self-improvement are fundamental principles of happiness.
As all are invited to contribute at the level of their ability, The Other Side Village will remain prosperous, safe, and strong.

For decades in Utah, we’ve wrung our hands about what to do with criminal offenders with long histories of addiction. Who would have thought that the solution was to have 150 longtime felons move into a home in downtown Salt Lake City? And yet, in 2015, that is exactly what began.

Since then, The Other Side Academy has become one of Utah’s gems – a model of citizenship, cleanliness, professionalism, and integrity. The students you see here have been arrested an average of 25 times. And yet when racial tension erupted into riots in downtown Salt Lake City in the summer of 2020, it was students of The Other Side Academy who rushed to the scene to clean up. When police spent sleepless nights preparing for civil unrest, it was students of The Other Side Academy who brought them coffee and encouragement.

When the Salt Lake City Council was considering whether to give The Other Side Academy permission to remain in its downtown location, over fifty neighbors turned out to say that the neighborhood was better because they were there. And the police officials gave a report that crime had actually gone down since we moved into the neighborhood.

And amazingly, all of this was done without any government funds. Students of The Other Side Academy pay their own way by running some of the most respected businesses in the state.

For decades in Utah, we’ve wrung our hands about how to help the growing number of people experiencing homelessness in our cities. We believe the same principles that have enabled students at The Other Side Academy to create a model community point the way to what must be done. While those experiencing chronic homelessness face different challenges than TOSA students, we contend that there are universal principles for creating healthy communities that give us a responsibility to step in.

Why? Because we understand what it is to be marginalized. We understand what it takes to become self-reliant. We have experience creating a peer community with strong values and shared accountability. The Other Side Village is a self-reliant, peer-led village that provides a safe, dignified, and uplifting life for people who are chronically unsheltered, and which brings them and the larger community into mutually ennobling relationships. Just like The Other Side Academy.