The National Alliance to End Home- lessness places the rural homeless population at 7 percent. It estimates that 14 out of every 10,000 people experiencing homelessness live in the country, compared with 29 out of 10,000 living in the city. National Public Radio reported in 2016 that these numbers may be too low—as they originate from the national point- in-time count done with the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The count omits people who sleep on couches or in cheap motels because there are no shelters in many rural areas. Yet many people missed by the January point-in- time count are, in fact, homeless and have no permanent residence. Rural homelessness tends to be an unseen and invisible problem that many states and communities are grappling with, notes the Pew Charitable Trusts. “It’s far more hidden than in the city. If you drive through certain parts of any urban environment, you can see it in front of you. In a rural area, you don’t see it,” said Dennis Van Kampen, president/ CEO of Mel Trotter Ministries in Grand Rapids, Michigan. “It’s the family that’s living in their minivan in the woods, or living in a tent at a campground. It’s the three families doubled up in a mobile home trailer who are trying to stay off the radar so no one takes their kids away,” Dennis said. A Call for Help F or MTM, working in rural areas began with a phone call to Den- nis from someone who works in the school system. She said, “Dennis, you guys do great things for the poor and homeless in the city, but when are you going to come out to the rural areas and do something for the poor people in the small town where you live?” This touched his heart. Dennis called the school superintendents in 10 rural communities around Grand Rapids and asked them to help him understand the 34 WWW.AGRM.ORG JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2018 Rural homelessness tends to be an unseen and invisible problem that many states and communities are grappling with