Pathways To & Through Houselessness in Natrona County.
A report to the community with input from currently and recently unhoused residents, exploring how risk accumulates across a lifetime, and what Natrona County can do about it.
Houselessness rarely begins with a single crisis.
This study was conducted for the Natrona County community to understand how pathways to and through houselessness emerge across the lifespan. Nineteen people who were currently or recently unhoused shared their stories and created "life graphs," visual timelines mapping major life events from childhood through adulthood.
Their stories reveal that houselessness develops over time, as developmental adversities cascade through family, school, and work, intersecting with difficult economic conditions and lack of affordable housing. For some, it reflected a lifetime of deep poverty; for others, a long slide from economic security to being unsheltered.
The study was funded primarily by Wyoming Governor Gordon's statewide mental health initiative, with logistical support from Natrona Collective Health Trust and ACE Interface. All interviews were conducted by Krista Goldstine-Cole, EdD. Ethics oversight: University of Montana IRB, Project FY2025-156.
Risk starts early, and accumulates over time.
Most participants faced serious risk long before losing housing as adults. Many described childhood maltreatment, family separation, or academic challenges. By adulthood, these early risks combined with job loss, illness, grief, and domestic violence to push people into houselessness.
Most commonly reported risk factors. Participants reported an average of 22.7 of 46 risk factors examined.
Although every story is unique, five patterns emerged.
Life graphs from participants were analyzed to identify prototypical pathways to and through houselessness in Natrona County. These composites are tools for community dialogue. They reflect patterns across participants and do not represent any single individual's experience.
Sustained, overwhelming risk
Lifelong adversity and poverty across home, school, and relationships. Structural barriers like felony records now limit housing options and access to public subsidies.
Need: Long-term, relationship-based supportRelational poverty
Deep aloneness from an early age. Difficulty identifying or escaping harmful relationships. Moving from crisis to crisis in "survival mode" with limited social support.
Need: Safe relationships and peer supportCollapsed identity
Relatively low childhood risk. Lost careers, often in natural resources, following economic shocks beginning in 2008. Loss of career led to loss of identity, then family and home.
Need: Help rebuilding purpose and work connectionsHealth-driven vulnerability
Disability or serious illness led to job loss and housing loss. Many navigating SSDI or disability benefit claims without support after losing a loved one who helped manage systems.
Need: Case management and disability navigationRebound and rebuild
Extremely challenging childhoods, including early houselessness and unaccompanied teen years, but this group is currently housed. They credit programs like Step Up and Iris House with helping them build life skills, support systems, and community connections. No one said it was easy. They emphasized the need for scaffolding, accountability, and motivation, such as reunification with children, as key ingredients in stabilizing their lives.
Need: Ongoing scaffolding in education, employment, and belongingWhat participants want community leaders to know.
Everyone who participated was asked what community leaders need to know about being unhoused in Casper, and what should be done to improve outcomes.
If you want to understand what it's like to be homeless, what it takes to navigate services, try being an undercover boss.
— study participantBeing unhoused is like being in a hole and it just keeps getting deeper and deeper. Set people up for success. Help people leaving jail or crisis programs rebuild credit, education, and stability.
— study participantSome crime is committed by homeless people, but there are others in the community who commit crimes. Houselessness is a community issue, not a character flaw. Stop shaming and blaming.
— study participantDon't forget the teens. Many adults who are unhoused first lost stable housing as teenagers, and teens may not be able to safely or adequately access support services.
— study participantEight areas where local action can make the biggest difference.
Results of the study point to eight areas where Natrona County can act now to prevent initial, episodic, or chronic houselessness.
Natrona County is already taking action.
Several local programs and partnerships are addressing the needs identified in this study. Here's how our community is responding.
The Situation Table
The Situation Table brings together faith leaders, probation and parole, mental health and health care providers, and other partners through the Safety and Justice Council to catch people on the verge of crisis before their lives fall apart.
Kind Grounds
Kind Grounds is a navigation center for people experiencing homelessness in Casper. Guests can relax, enjoy hot coffee, breakfast, and lunch, and connect with services and community partners. It's a place to rest during the day and get support to move forward.
Central Wyoming Counseling Center
Central Wyoming Counseling Center offers Crisis Stabilization Services, including a Mobile Crisis Response team. Professionals are deployed into the community to provide direct assistance during a crisis wherever it's happening.
The Children's Advocacy Project
Child advocacy centers bring together the services kids need to heal after abuse. The Children's Advocacy Project (CAP) was the first child advocacy center in Wyoming to receive the prestigious National Children's Alliance Accreditation, addressing a key upstream risk factor identified in this study.
Plans of Safe Care
The Wyoming Plans of Safe Care initiative promotes a multidisciplinary approach to supporting pregnant women who experience substance use and their babies. The goal is ensuring families have the support needed for family stability and reducing separation of mother and baby.
Mourning Dove Grief Care
With 89% of study participants identifying death of a loved one as a risk factor, grief support is critical. Mourning Dove Grief Care, through Central Wyoming Hospice & Transitions, offers free grief support and counseling to anyone in the community. No referral needed.
What other communities have done, and what works.
This report identifies practices used by comparable communities, including Bozeman, MT, Grand Junction, CO, and Missoula, MT, that align with the needs identified by Natrona County participants.
Houselessness Prevention
Targeted rental subsidies and housing support when exiting psychiatric care, focused on at-risk individuals before houselessness occurs.
Specialty Courts
Courts designed specifically for unhoused individuals, connecting them with services and reducing legal financial obligations. An approach adopted in communities across California including Los Angeles, Sacramento, and San Diego.
Permanent Supportive Housing
Non-time-limited housing combined with wraparound services including mental health care, job training, and case management for people with complex needs.
Trauma-Informed Housing
Design and service approach centered on safety, empowerment, and healing, especially for survivors of trafficking and intimate partner violence.
Child Advocacy Centers
Designed to interrupt the cascade of risk following child sexual abuse, addressing a key upstream factor identified in this study.
Inclusive Education
Providing needed support services to students with disabilities while maintaining access to grade-level curriculum, rather than segregated special education placements that can compound early adversity.
Read the full report.
The complete report includes composite life graphs for all five pathways, detailed methodology, and expanded recommendations for prevention and intervention in Natrona County.
Download the Full ReportPDF · Natrona Collective Health Trust · November 2025 · Krista Goldstine-Cole, EdD