You shield your children, but if your husband's getting evicted, how am I going to survive? How am I going to feed them? How am I going to pay my bills? That's what a parent's supposed to do. I told them, I got you. Don't worry, I got you. I remember it very vividly. It was March 15th. We were asked to go home because COVID hit. We really had no clue as to what to expect. Within just a few days of that, it really became apparent that a lot of people were going to be out of work without income, and therefore their housing was going to be at risk. Everything was quick. We were up and running with a rudimentary system in about three weeks. It was a glorified Excel sheet that we used. We just did not have the tools to do what we ultimately needed to do. We were in desperate need of a new system. So DreamKey Partners reached out to Publicis Sapient to build a more sophisticated platform. It's not enough to just say you need to transform and here's some amazing digital tools. You really need to understand what they're trying to achieve, and that only comes by listening.
I'm Jeremy Johnson. I'm in business development for Publicis Sapient, and I work with state and local clients up and down the East Coast. We started meeting with Jeremy morning, noon, and sometimes late night. We had a fantastic team, but we had to build trust really quickly with them. Our focus was to get millions of dollars out the door. Working with PS allowed us to be able to focus on what we were good at doing, and it then allowed them to focus on the technical stuff to get us where we needed to be. It's still really humbling. Of course, we're bringing that technology and we know these tools really well, but it's really the impact that we align on. I wasn't expecting to be in the documentary. We had been asked to provide the names of applicants who had had really good success because of the Ramp program. I gave Kirsten Lomax's name. Three months later, I was asked if I was willing to be interviewed. So I was not expecting to be in a documentary.
My name is Kate Haisley. My job is to process applications from people seeking help with rent and utilities based on their COVID hardships. The application itself was a digital application, but it's seven pages long. DreamKey had to translate those guidelines into what they needed to see on the screen. When someone applies online, the information gets put into a Salesforce application. That application is then assigned to someone in my position, and we're able to go into it. Having a database that allowed us to compile all of the documents that a customer may have sent over, and then all you have to do is just click on the button and it pops up. You can actually formulate it to make a file so that it's nice and pretty for an auditor. It was a game changer for us. It isn't buying software. The truth is it was the people. It was the staff members who were behind it who said, we're going to implement this system, we're going to get it up and running, and then they did. And that was just the most amazing part of that. When we hit the deadline, I think within a few weeks, we had the application up and running for people to use. If you think about trying to do what we do with the U.S. Postal Service, it wouldn't happen. I mean, there's no way you could get someone from a position where, say, they're a week out from a court date, or worse, a week out from lockout. If we didn't have Salesforce and the ability to react quickly, we wouldn't be able to help people. It is a crazy good success. It was like turning on a fire hose. And we were sitting there when we turned the lights on, on the solution, seeing these applications just roll in.
We're on your side with information that could help you if you're behind on your rent, your mortgage, or utility bill. The RAMP program has helped more than 18,000 household renters affected by the pandemic pay for their rent and utilities. In 2021, we were able to help 320 households experiencing homelessness into housing. How does it make me feel? I mean, that's the why I do what I do. Even though we see that every day and we're able to help people every day, when you see it on screen and you see what it means to them, I mean, it's just super emotional. Just watching the film, I mean, it's about DreamKey not wanting anyone to fall through the cracks. It's the story there of these women that made it happen. We made about $75 million in rent relief payments through this program, over 11,000 households that I know that we assisted in our last fiscal year through this process. It feels amazing that we've been able to help that many people keep a home over their head, like a roof. It creates stability. And to know that we created that and it's tangible, I can go and find someone that I helped and I can touch them. It's amazing. There's nothing, no other job that would allow me to do that. It's concrete evidence that what we do makes a difference. Thousands, 20,000, and just all of them in the exact same position, all of them just looking for something, you know. You know, there's so often you just don't think there is hope. And in this case, you know, we were able to help and I'm just so grateful.