Riding on a city bus, Cynthia Keller got a phone call. She started weeping. After four years of homelessness, she learned she would finally have a place of her own.

The phone call announcing a “golden ticket”—or housing voucher—came thanks to a massive coordinated push by a network of city homelessness agencies.

Keller and 97 other homeless people have received golden tickets of their own, as part of the city’s “100-day challenge” to house 75 percent of the city’s chronically homeless. Of those 98, 26 have already been housed.

As the clock winds down to the July 30 challenge deadline, homelessness agencies are pushing to meet the goal of 107 people housed. With the help of staff at the Columbus House, and with her voucher in hand, Keller (pictured above) is looking at apartments and aims to move in as soon as possible.

For more on this story, visit: 98 Homeless People Win “Golden Tickets” | New Haven Independent.