Affordable houses have been sprouting up all over Marin.

They're not for living in — they're bigger than a dollhouse but a tad smaller than a child's playhouse — but they may help Marin's growing homeless population get back on their feet and maybe one day back into a home of their own.

It's Art Houses of Marin, a public art project created by Ritter Center as a way to keep discussions about homelessness front and center as well as raise money for the nonprofit's work with the county's needy.

A few of the very artists who painted and decorated the 25 miniature houses know about that all too well, or so here reporter Jim Welte discovers in this week's Covered.

Marin's homeless numbers are up, and the economic downtown has made all of us more vulnerable. Public art adds color and creativity to our neighborhoods, but it's the heart of the project that is helping to keep people in those neighborhoods.

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— Vicki Larson, here editor