Opportunity Overview
Wake County, North Carolina has issued RFP #26-052, Competitive Grant for Medical Respite Facility. The County will fund eligible capital investment to create or renovate a medical respite facility for people experiencing unsheltered homelessness who are medically fragile or frequent users of hospitals, EMS, jails, homeless services, or other healthcare systems. Medical respite is defined in the RFP as short-term housing combined with residential care such as meals, personal care, wellness services, wound care, medication management, and transportation to medical appointments.
Funding and Allowable Costs
Wake County will make a one-time $500,000 grant award. Payment is on a reimbursement basis and must follow the approved budget. Eligible capital activities include acquisition, design, renovation, or construction of a medical respite facility. The project must create at least 20 medical respite units and must be operational and providing services by January 2028. Up to 50% of the grant may be used to establish a dedicated operating reserve for future operating needs, cash-flow management, risk mitigation, and unexpected or urgent needs. The proposal must show a plan to sustain operations for the 10-year compliance period.
Eligibility
Eligible applicants may be for-profit or nonprofit entities and must demonstrate the financial and development capacity and experience necessary to complete the project. The project must be located in Wake County. Multiple organizations may apply through a collaboration or joint venture, but a lead entity must be designated. The lead entity must own and develop the project and be financially responsible for property-secured debt. At application, the applicant must already own the proposed property or have a current legally binding contract to purchase it. Applicants must also have established partnerships for supportive services, whether provided internally or by partner organizations.
Submission and Deadline
Proposals are due October 8, 2026 before 3:00 PM Eastern Time through the Wake County Bonfire Portal. Questions or requests for clarification must be submitted through Bonfire by September 14, 2026 at 5:00 PM. Wake County states that answers will be issued by addendum no later than September 21, 2026. Late proposals will not be accepted. The RFP also prohibits proposers from initiating contact with Wake County employees, evaluation committee members, or Commissioners during the solicitation and evaluation period; unauthorized contact may result in disqualification.
Required Application Package
The proposal must include a detailed organizational-capability narrative; a proposal summary with legal organization name, addresses, Federal Tax ID, DUNS number, website, primary and authorizing contacts, facility location, funding requested, and number of beds; organizational capacity and relevant project experience; a description of the project, medical and supportive services, transportation, partnerships, and use of lived-experience input; and complete financial information. The financial package must include a full budget identifying Wake County funds plus all leveraged agency cash and in-kind sources, line-item expenditure budgets categorized by development, operating, and supportive services in an Excel workbook, and the organization’s most recent audited financial statements. Written documentation of other funding commitments is desirable.
Nonprofit applicants must additionally provide bylaws, articles of incorporation, IRS 501(c)(3) determination letter, current-year operating budget, most recent audited financials or three years of financial statements, and a current board list. Supportive-service plans must identify the organizations providing services and include the partner service plan(s).
Evaluation and Program Requirements
Wake County will score proposals on organizational expertise, project information, supportive services, financial capacity, and community/client considerations. Financial capacity carries the greatest weight and includes a detailed sources-and-uses spreadsheet, an annual operating budget, leveraged capital and operating funding, ability to cover cost overruns, and experience administering government funding. Applicants, developers, and general contractors may not be debarred, and applicants must not have overdue tax debt or outstanding tax liens.
Funded programs must operate in alignment with Wake County’s Bridge to Home model, participate in HMIS, report key performance indicators monthly, actively engage with the Wake County Continuum of Care, and progressively align with National Health Care for the Homeless Council medical-respite best practices. Projects should address ADA accessibility and describe how acute and post-acute conditions will be managed outside the hospital, including onsite or coordinated primary care, wound care, medication management, behavioral health, clinical protocols, referral pathways, case management, benefits navigation, housing support, and discharge planning.
Match and Cost Share
The RFP does not state a mandatory fixed-percentage non-Federal match or cost share. However, applicants must disclose leveraged cash and in-kind revenue, competitive applications are expected to leverage alternative capital and operating funds, and applicants must demonstrate the ability to cover potential cost overruns. Atlas therefore treats leveraging as a significant competitiveness and financial-capacity factor rather than a formal mandatory match percentage.
Contact and Amendments
The RFP does not designate an individual contact for applicant questions. All questions and clarifications must be submitted through the Wake County Bonfire Portal, and the no-contact rule should be observed. The RFP schedule states that question-response addenda, if necessary, will be issued no later than September 21, 2026. The current RFP copy reviewed by Atlas does not itself contain a later amendment, so applicants must monitor the live Bonfire procurement record for any addenda before submitting.
Atlas Fit Analysis
Atlas Opportunity Score: 96/100. This is a clearly funded, currently open North Carolina healthcare/homelessness opportunity with a defined $500,000 award, a concrete medical-respite scope, a meaningful application window, and an identifiable local provider ecosystem. The score is moderated by the one-award structure, substantial real-estate/development burden, reimbursement financing, and the requirement that the applicant already own or have a binding purchase contract for the property.
N9+ Fit Score: 30/100. The RFP explicitly values technology as part of community/client considerations and requires safe management of acute and post-acute conditions with onsite or coordinated primary care, wound care, medication management, and behavioral health. A remote physical-examination platform could therefore have a legitimate ancillary clinical-access role. However, the principal funded uses are acquisition, design, renovation/construction, and an operating reserve, and the RFP does not expressly establish telehealth or connected-diagnostic equipment as a separately eligible project cost. Atlas will not force N9+ into the budget without applicant-led clinical design and confirmation of allowability.
Dr. Miltie / QC Healthcare direct-applicant assessment: Dr. Miltie/QC Healthcare is not advanced as a direct lead applicant on the facts currently verified. The lead applicant must own/develop the Wake County property, be financially responsible for property debt, demonstrate facility development and medical-respite operating capacity, establish supportive-service partnerships, and sustain a minimum 20-unit program for the required compliance period. A technology or clinical-support role would be subordinate to an independently eligible applicant and subject to the applicant’s procurement, budget, and program design.
Realistic Eligible Organizations
The Women’s Center of Wake County / Safe Haven is a realistic organization to evaluate because the National Health Care for the Homeless Council directory identifies its Raleigh Safe Haven program as an operating nonprofit medical-respite program. Its eligibility for this specific grant remains conditional on satisfying the RFP’s property ownership or binding-purchase-contract requirement, development and financial-capacity tests, ability to scale to at least 20 units, and all required financial and supportive-service documentation. Advance Community Health is also a realistic clinical/supportive-services partner in Raleigh based on its homeless-health programming and medical-respite coordination, but Atlas does not treat it as the property-owning lead applicant absent evidence that it satisfies the development requirements.
Next Action
Potential applicants should immediately verify the live Wake County Bonfire package, submit any material clarification questions by September 14 at 5:00 PM, monitor for addenda through September 21 and thereafter, confirm property control, prepare the 20-unit development and 10-year sustainability plan, document supportive-service partnerships, and assemble the complete sources-and-uses, operating budget, audited financials, and organizational attachments. Applicant-controlled certifications, property documents, financial commitments, signatures, and service plans must come from the applicant and must not be fabricated.
Controlling RFP copy reviewed: Wake County RFP #26-052, Competitive Grant for Medical Respite Facility. Submission/current-addenda portal: Wake County Bonfire Portal.