Oakland County residents give back to family, community, and more after experiencing homelessness

Pontiac resident Labrea Robinson experienced homelessness on and off from age 13 to 21, living across the Detroit area in girls' homes, homeless shelters, hotel rooms, and her car. She says a troubled family life while she was growing up led her to "hanging out with the wrong crowd" as a young adult. But Robinson says becoming pregnant with her now 6-year-old daughter, Amarrah, "changed [her] perspective of life."

"She made me feel like I had a purpose in life," Robinson says. "She made me feel like I needed to change. She made me feel like everything I've been through was for a reason."

It took a lot of support to help Robinson get back on her feet. Through local organizations including Community Housing Network (CHN), Lighthouse, Michigan Works!, and Common Ground, she found transitional housing, entered a cash assistance program that required her to maintain a job, and eventually secured permanent housing. Now, Robinson is forging ahead with her next chapter. She's pursuing her GED with the eventual goal of going to college for computer science. She's created a nonprofit called Mom Resource Hub, through which she hopes to help other mothers navigate challenges similar to those she faced. And she serves on CHN's resident leadership committee, organizing community outreach events.

Now that Robinson's life has stabilized, she says it's important to her to do what she can to ensure that others don't wind up in the same situation she did. She describes it as "paying her dues."

"I like to give what I didn't have coming up as a kid," she says. "I didn't have no community leaders. So it really inspired me as a person to want to help people."

While Robinson's goals may be particularly ambitious, the arc of her journey back from experiencing homelessness is not. Kirsten Elliott, CEO and president of CHN, estimates that 95% or more of the people her organization serves are seeking to regain housing so they can stabilize their lives, better support their families, and become "productive members of society."
Kirsten ElliottKirsten Elliott.
"I want to dispel the myth that we are helping people just to keep them stuck in the system and not have any agency or sovereignty over their own lives," she says. "The work that we do is to really give them that foundation so that they can become successful and lead a life that they want to lead."

Giving back to family

For many who are stabilizing after experiencing homelessness, reconnecting to family is a top priority. 

"I can't begin to explain to you how many people over the years that we've worked with [for whom] that has been a real driving force," Elliott says. "They get really committed to their recovery, really committed to maintaining the stability, and doing whatever it takes so that they can create a better life for their children."

Robinson's commitment to her daughter – whose name means "grace of God" in the Igbo language – is a prime example. Robinson says she's dedicated to ensuring Amarrah has "a good education, or at least a decent one, where she gets the help she needs to become the person she wants to be."

"Without the proper resources or the proper guidance or the proper environment, it's not gonna happen," Robinson says. "And I know because I'm the walking truth. I've been through it already."
Steve KossLabrea Robinson with her daughter Amarrah.
Pontiac resident Shariki Bell experienced a particularly painful kind of distance from her son, Calvin, during her experience with homelessness from 2006 to 2012. Bell had experienced a mental health crisis, the result of what was later diagnosed as bipolar disorder, and she wound up living in a camper parked in her friend's driveway after being evicted from her apartment. She knew she had to let her son Calvin, now 23, live with his father at the time. Calvin and his father came to visit regularly, but she was adamant that Calvin not stay overnight with her. She recalls explaining her situation to him when he was 7 years old.

"He was so mature for his age," Bell says. "He literally understood. ... He never made me feel bad about it."
Steve KossShariki Bell in her apartment in Pontiac.
Once Bell got the mental health care she needed and stabilized enough to seek and attain housing, she started having Calvin stay with her again.

"Me and his dad were co-parenting, so he would stay with his dad during the week and he would stay with me on the weekends," she says. "So it allowed those things. It allowed my grandchildren to come visit. It allowed me to feel like a human again, a human that's getting things done."

Giving back to community

Beyond rebuilding relationships with her children and grandchildren, Bell has also become an activist and community advocate since she got back on her feet over a decade ago. She now speaks regularly at events held by Lighthouse, which helped her get her first apartment after her experience with homelessness. Elliott says she's seen similar behavior among many of CHN's clients.

"Many of the people that we work with, once they get their stability and their recovery, ... want to do something to give back to their community," she says.

The act of giving back takes many forms. Some people, like Robinson, do work through charitable organizations or start organizations of their own. Others take smaller, but still meaningful, actions. Elliott references one man who has donated $10 a year to CHN every year since the nonprofit helped him find housing.

"That's awesome, and it matters," she says. "And it gives him a sense of purpose and meaning and that he is expressing his gratitude and paying it forward for people."

Since finding stable housing after experiencing homelessness, Pontiac resident Twila Allen has helped others in small but consistent ways. Allen, 49, lost her job in an assembly plant in 2023 after a foot injury rendered her unable to work. Shortly after that, she was diagnosed with Stage 3 cervical cancer. In November 2023, within two weeks of her going to stay at HOPE Shelter in Pontiac, she says staff were instrumental in helping her find her own apartment again. Allen, a mother of 12 and grandmother of 20, says regaining housing gave her "the freedom to fight that cancer." She was pronounced cancer-free in February 2024.
Twila AllenTwila Allen.
"You can't be out on the street when you fight cancer," she says. "And then it gives me the ability to be with my grandchildren. I went back to school for my GED. It gives you focus."

After she completes her GED, Allen says she wants to get more involved in her church and "programs to help other people." In the meantime, she periodically drops off food for HOPE Shelter residents. She says she recently donated cereal, milk, apples, and bread to the shelter.

"You gotta give back," she says. "I think that's a must. Because if nobody gave to me, I wouldn't have had a chance."

"I need this help"

For every formerly homeless person interviewed in this story, supportive services were essential in getting back on track to being better family members and citizens. Allen says HOPE Shelter staff "helped [her] live," assisting her with repairing her credit score, building her self-esteem, and learning anger management skills. Bell says that, while experiencing homelessness, it's necessary to have people willing to "put their arms around you and walk you through it with patience, grace, and dignity." 

For 38-year-old Pontiac resident Vonantio Fullmore, the support of multiple service providers has been helpful to stabilize after numerous adverse experiences throughout his life. Fullmore's mother died by suicide when he was only 11, following intense depression that had ensued two years earlier after Fullmore's father cheated on her. He entered foster care at age 13.

"I became an adult, basically, at an early age," he says. "... What put tears to my heart and my face was when I saw other parents loving their children and having a father and listening to your children and everything. And then I said, 'I wish I had that.'"
Patrick DunnVonantio Fullmore at the Baldwin Center.
Last year, Fullmore fell victim to an online identity theft scam, which he says "pretty much wiped [his] whole [bank] account out." He lost his apartment and experienced homelessness for 8 months, which he describes as "the most scariest thing in the world." Fullmore went to stay at HOPE Shelter, where he found supportive staff willing to help him find a new apartment and rebuild his life. 

"The staff there was actually gracious enough to understand who I am," he says, adding that he had "a second family a little bit there."

Since finding housing last October, Fullmore has also become a regular at Wellness Wednesdays, a weekly program organized by Oakland County at the Baldwin Center in Pontiac. Wellness Wednesdays brings together representatives of over a dozen local organizations to provide one-stop access to housing resources, career and employment support, medical services, showers, laundry services, and more. He says events like Wellness Wednesdays are crucial for people who have recently experienced homelessness.

"Some people are a little shy, like myself, to ask for help because they're prideful or they have some issues," he says. "I had to understand and develop strength enough to sit there and say, 'Hey, I need this help.' It's about time to crunch down and get to the actual brass tacks so I can actually have a better future."

Fullmore is on Social Security Disability Insurance, but he's seeking a job now for extra income to get his life back on track. He says his "endgame" is to find permanent housing and start a family, so he can give his kids a better childhood than he had. He's particularly interested in finding work at HOPE Shelter so he can help others who are going through what he experienced last year. In the meantime, he says he tries to advise and inspire others who are currently struggling with homelessness.

"There's always hope in the darkness," he says. "... Just because you're going through some harsh times at this moment in time, don't give up."