Pulaski County's Providence Park Tiny-Home Village Nears First Move-Ins

Crews from The Simple Nest were hard at work filling houses at Providence Park with furniture when the Pulaski County, Arkansas tiny-home village prepared to welcome its first three neighbors earlier this month. The nonprofit, which helps families in need by partnering with existing organizations to furnish homes, worked to make each unit feel lived-in before residents arrived.

The first few people moved in within the 30-day window that Providence Park Founder and CEO Errin Stanger described in recent reporting, marking the opening chapter of a project that ultimately aims to provide 400 homes for people experiencing homelessness.

The scale of what Providence Park offers goes well beyond four walls and a roof. Stanger was direct about the vision: "Providence Park is more than just permanent housing. It's wrap-around services with a lot of intentional integrity aspects to it that ensure our neighbors have holistic care. And so, of course, they have the permanent housing. They also have, of course, access to a kitchen and laundry. We have a garden, we have an orchard, we have a labyrinth, we have a dog park. We also have an incredible building, our medical clinic, so it has medical care, mental health care, and dental care for our neighbors."

That list of amenities, from the orchard to the on-site dental clinic, is what separates Providence Park from a basic shelter model. The village was backed by local officials and nonprofit partners, and The Simple Nest's involvement ensured that the initial units were ready to receive residents rather than simply be occupied.

For a tiny-home community, the breadth of services Stanger described reflects a philosophy common in the most successful permanent supportive housing projects: that a door that locks is necessary but not sufficient. Holistic care, in Providence Park's framing, means residents have access to mental health support and a garden in the same zip code as their front door.

With 400 homes as the eventual target, Providence Park's first three move-ins represent a small but concrete milestone in what the project's founders expect to become one of the more ambitious tiny-home villages serving the unhoused in Arkansas. Volunteers interested in supporting the project, including through tree-planting efforts on the grounds, can reach out to Providence Park directly for details on upcoming opportunities.