Blog: Homelessness Ends Here

Three years ago, Gail Richards and Judy Kishner, local philanthropists and cousins, decided to take on their dream of ending chronic homelessness in Tulsa, Oklahoma, by 2012. To accomplish this dream, they focused on the development of new units of “housing first” affordable housing. Their approach, unique to Tulsa, but beginning to be studied by others around the country, is a “debt free” model of housing, allowing rents to remain low and affordable for people with limited income or no income at all. This debt free model provides housing that is safe, affordable, decent, and sustainable. The specialized housing also provides supportive assistance to the residents when needed.

Just about anyone working to solve the problem of homelessness in our communities recognizes that coordinating public and private efforts is a key ingredient to measurable, sustainable success. On February 10, Funders Together and the Los Angeles Homeless Funders Group co-convened a gathering to explore models of public-private partnerships and reflect on lessons learned. Forty representatives from public and private sector entities participated in the meeting.

A new report entitled, "Inclusive Public Housing: Services for the Hard to House," released last week by the Urban Institute presents fascinating new findings regarding the service needs and vulnerability of families living in public housing. The report find that families living in distressed public housing fall within three categories of need: younger “striving” families who require just basic assistance to achieve self-sufficiency; “aging and distressed” families who have multiple physical and medical challenges; and families who are “high-risk,” with complex health and social challenges and who, without adequate supports, will become tomorrow’s “aging and distressed” families.

Recently, the Ohio Interagency Council on Homeless and Affordable Housing adopted a new State of Ohio Permanent Supportive Housing (PSH) Policy Framework intended to create 6,000 new units of PSH for the most vulnerable households with serious and long term disabilities. “By adopting this groundbreaking comprehensive approach to permanent supportive housing – which focuses on preventing and ending chronic homelessness as well as reducing Ohio’s use of expensive and unnecessary institutions – the State of Ohio has become a national leader in PSH policy” said Ann O’Hara, Associate Director of the Technical Assistance Collaborative in Boston, who helped to draft the policy framework.

Funders Together members wear many hats in their communities – they act as investors, spokespersons, issue experts and mentors. One of the most important tools that any funder can use is its own reputation and influence. The Plough Foundation in Memphis, TN offers a perfect example of the potential for foundation leadership at the local level, as described in this profile of the foundation from the Southeastern Council on Foundation's February/March 2010 Interchange newsletter.

"Homelessness among veterans will be ended in five years." This is a bold statement, especially when you consider that an estimated 131,000 veterans remain homeless today with new veterans becoming homeless at unprecedented rates after returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. The good news: the federal government has increased public investments in the one programmatic solution capable of ending veteran homelessness in five years: Permanent Supportive Housing.

The Osteopathic Heritage Foundation, co-convener of the Funders Together Ohio regional affiliate, is playing a catalytic role in helping to end homelessness in Southeast and Central Ohio through support for capacity building, planning, technical assistance and implementation of homelessness coalitions and service providers in the area. A recent e-newsletter from the foundation provided updates on three initiatives that have been at the core of this work.

On February 1st President Obama released his FY 2011 budget request. This post summarizes highlights in the HUD budget related to homelessness, as well as initial reactions from leading homelessness advocacy groups.

A summary of tweets from the Funders Together twitter feed. Follow us at @FundersTogether for real-time updates!

In 2000, the National Alliance to End Homelessness unveiled the aptly titled, "A Plan, Not a Dream: How to End Homelessness in Ten Years." The 10-Year Plan, as it came to be called, presented a fresh, comprehensive and multi-system approach to ending homelessness. It utilized data, leveraged existing support systems, promoted outreach and focused on housing. It integrated all we knew about the most promising and proven practices to end homelessness. Now, 10 years after the launch, we pause to take stock of our progress.