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Over the course of a year, the Alliance has been engaged in the production of a book. Today, the Alliance is delighted to announce that the book has been published and is available for purchase!

Dream of a Nation is an anthology of essays about the most pressing issues facing the country today:  bolstering the economy, improving health care, ending poverty, fostering community, creating constructive media, among others. The essays are penned by the national experts, including the Alliance’s own Nan Roman, who contributed an essay – co-written by Alliance board member Irene Mabry Moses – about ending homelessness in America.

Moving forward, we’ll tell you more about the Dream of a Nation campaign, how to get involved, where to buy the book, and what you can do to learn more about fulfilling the dream of our United States. For now, please check out the website, learn about the publisher, and read a few reviews.

Today’s guest post comes to us from the Alliance’s new federal policy fellow Sam Strike.

Hi everyone! This is Sam Strike, the new Federal Policy Fellow at the National Alliance to End Homelessness. I will be here for the fall helping the policy team find the best evidence-based policies and using them to end homelessness.

Issues of housing and homelessness first became personal for me when I taught at a middle school summer program in New York City. A couple of the kids I taught were in and out of homes and shelters. It was eye-opening to interact with these smart, fun kids and their great, supportive parents. There was no reason why they should be out on the street.

Then I worked for the housing unit at Legal Services of Eastern Missouri. I worked with people who were getting kicked out of their homes and it became clear to me that something was wrong with the system- and that some people were being unfairly treated.

At Legal Services, I was helping people avoid homelessness through HPRP grants and I got to see first-hand how much good a federal policy can do in real people’s lives. Much of the recent national narrative has been focused on reducing the role of the federal government in citizen’s lives – but I was privileged to see how much good government can actually do. If we’re able to turn great ideas into effective, efficient federal programs, we can make a tangible and significant impact on the lives of people most in need of our help. And that’s what I came to the Alliance to learn to do.

Homelessness is a concrete problem that we can study, address, and solve. I want to learn as much as I can while I’m here and contribute to the great work that the people here at the Alliance are doing. If we put together a coherent and well-funded homeless system, we can make sure that everybody has the dignity of a home to call their own. This is a goal that the Alliance is working to achieve with their revolutionary Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness, which focuses on prevention, rapid re-housing, and other housing-based solutions.

When I’m not at the Alliance, you’ll find me settling into my own new home in the District! I just graduated from law school at Washington University in St. Louis and moved into the city. I’m originally from Cincinnati (go Reds) and you can find me exploring DC, trying new restaurants, or looking for a good hiking trail.

Last week, Alliance president and CEO Nan Roman attended the first National Poverty Summit in Fort Worth, Texas hosted by Catholic Charities USA. The conference hosted leaders from 10 leading national human service organizations, including Save the Children, the Alliance, and Bread for the World, who engaged in a discussion about pragmatic, strategic, and compassionate ways to reduce poverty.

Since the Census released their report last week, there have been a number of news stories about the increasing number of people struggling to keep themselves clothed, fed, and housed. Only this morning, the New York Times reported that one in five New York City residents live in poverty; the Baltimore Sun said the number is one in four in their city. The Associated Press singled out the young adult population – who face a stagnant job market and the burden of school debt – as a group with a higher risk of poverty.

It goes without saying that there exists a relationship between homelessness and poverty (specifically deep poverty). Most people who experience homelessness were very, very poor before they were lost their housing. As such, programs that alleviate poverty also keep people and families from falling into homelessness.

But such programs are being threatened. With deficit reduction fervor racing through Washington (and much of the country), even effective, efficient government programs that help people move out of poverty and homelessness are at risk of being axed. And there is a flurry of other news articles – from Missouri to Arizona to Illinois – that have documented the potential human cost of denying these critical services to people who need them most.

While austerity is an important virtue, it cannot be achieved by punishing those who are already going without. As Nan Roman remarked at the National Poverty Summit, “We do have a deficit, but we can’t reduce the budget on the backs of vulnerable people. It’s a false savings when we allow so many more people to become homeless and stay poor.”

To get involved with protecting these programs and ending homelessness, please visit the website or contact us.

Anna and I are back!

Hope you enjoyed the guest bloggers/social networkers in our absence. I thought the blog last week was particularly terrific (though I may be biased) – from Elizabeth’s presentation of the Alliance Annual Report, to Norm’s data-rich explanation of Alameda County’s homeless system outcomes, to Lisa’s discussion of how Medicaid can help end chronic homelessness, and Pete’s rundown of the Census poverty numbers. And we were lucky to have fan favorite Steve Berg, Alliance VP of Program and Policy, return to make the case for investing more federal resources in the McKinney-Vento program.

As you can see, we’re lucky to have experts on a wide range of topics – from health care to research to housing. Homelessness is a complex issue, one at which a number of disciplines intersect, and we at the Alliance examine the problem from many, varied perspectives and distill those disparate ideas into efficient, effective solutions to homelessness.

In order to turn our analyses and observations into solutions, we:

Review research: Our resident researcher reads up on homelessness data and research as well as homeless-related indicators and issues, including poverty, deep poverty, housing cost burden, and unemployment. Our research series, including Economy Bytes, Data Points, and other reports crunch the numbers and try to understand what they mean about homelessness.

Improve policy: Not only is our research helpful to our friends, colleagues, and you – this research is also helpful to our policy team. Armed with the latest research and statistics, we explain to lawmakers why it’s important to invest in the policies and programs that prevent and end homelessness. Making the case to invest more money in McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Grants is much more convincing when paired with data about rising levels of poverty, increased homelessness, and persistent unemployment.

Build capacity: When policies are enacted and approved, there’s work to be done on the field. While the role of federal policy is significant, ending homelessness is ultimately a local task. Our Center for Capacity Building travels directly into cities and towns to conduct clinics and trainings, they create tools to explain best practices and promising strategies, and they explain how to improve systems by collecting and using data.

For more information about the Alliance or to find ways you can get involved with our mission, please visit the website or contact us.

Monday was the six year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina’s landfall on southern Louisiana. Today – six years later – people in the Gulf Coast are still struggling to recover from the devastating effects of the storm.

National Public Radio ran a couple pieces this week about the struggle of some communities to secure housing. In one story, the reporter discusses the plight of people along the Mississippi coast – communities that were overlooked by state agencies and federal aid. While some assistance is reaching them now, some posit that the help is both little and late.

In a second NPR story, a reporter profiles Pamela Landry, a woman who built a house with two sheds after her mobile home was destroyed by the hurricane. The makeshift home was a step up from the FEMA trailer that she lived in for two years following Katrina but still lacks insulation and heating, among other amenities.

Earlier this year, the Alliance re-examined homelessness in the Gulf Coast, explicitly noting the great increases in homelessness in Louisiana/Mississippi region, largely attributable to people left vulnerable to housing instability after Katrina came through the area. On this, the 6th anniversary of that terrible natural disaster, we remind ourselves of the damage the storm caused to so many communities and the vast number of people out there still awaiting the aid necessary to rebuild their lives. (To see the insert about Hurricane Katrina in The State of Homelessness in America, see page 10.)

It is up to us to ensure that people are not left behind again. In the wake of some unusual natural disasters in the country(a mid-Atlantic earthquake and Hurricane Irene come to mind), we realize that the unexpected can strike at any time, causing chaos and havoc for ordinary citizens. We urge local, state, and federal agencies to commit themselves to help people affected by disaster – we can work to ensure that their lives resume normalcy as quickly and efficiently as possible.

On Friday, our dear federal policy intern Rricha left us to go back to law school. But before she left, we asked her to list some things she learned during her time at the Alliance.

1. Runaway and homeless youth are especially susceptible in falling victim to commercial sexual exploitation.
2. Thirty years ago, homelessness wasn’t as big of a problem as it is today- it is possible to end homelessness with clear and directed federal policies.
3. Don’t bring an [empty] travel mug with you to the Capitol Visitors Center – they will throw it away (even if it’s new and from Starbucks!)
4. We need better data on how many homeless youth there are in this country so we can shape policies that most affect and empower this population.
5. It is much cheaper to house a homeless person than to pay the costs of incarceration or medical expenses over his or her lifetime.
6. The phones at the Alliance are very musical.
7. Foster care children who age out of the child welfare system are at high risk for becoming homeless.
8. Making a personalized google map isn’t as difficult as it sounds!
9. All the programs related to helping homeless populations have a sustainability component – a long term plan to keep them off the streets.
10. Andre Wade, youth policy analyst, cannot function without his iPad.

Today, we’re running a repeat of an oldie but a goodie. In this slow summer month, we take a moment to revisit (like we did with “Nan’s post) a fundamental question in our field: why Housing First?

First we ask: What is Housing First?

Housing First is a concept that was pioneered by Dr. Sam Tsemberis of the NYU School of Medicine and an organization in New York called Pathways to Housing.

The premise of the Housing First campaign is the housing is a basic human right and should not be denied to anyone, regardless of their habits or circumstances. Housing First prescribes providing the homeless permanent supportive housing – which includes supportive services coupled with permanent housing (not shelter). The supportive services address addiction, mental health, case management and the like, and provides stability for homeless individuals. These services increase the ability of homeless individuals to maintain permanent housing and achieve self-sufficiency.

It’s important to note that this approach is a significant departure from the traditional way the country approached homelessness before. In the old system, homelessness management was emphasized through shelter, mental health services, medical services, and the like before permanent housing was even considered an option. The premise of this old program was that homeless people had to “earn” permanent housing – an unintentionally patronizing framework. Housing First, as the name suggests, emphasizes housing first, coupled with services, bypassing shelter altogether.

Why Housing First?

Put simply: it works. Studies have shown that those communities who implement Housing First strategies have successfully helped people achieve self-sufficiency and get out of homelessness.

In May of this month, the Philadelphia Inquirer published a story about some of the successes the Housing First model has seen in the last few years:

“To cite two: 85 percent of formerly homeless adults have maintained a permanent home after five years in the organization Beyond Shelter’s housing-first program in Los Angeles. And in Pathways to Housing’s program for formerly homeless people with psychiatric disabilities in New York City, 88 percent have been able to maintain a permanent home, compared with only 47 percent of the residents in the city’s traditional program.”

In fact, between 2005 and 2007, the nation saw a nearly 30 percent decrease in the chronic homelessness population, much of which has been attributed to the Housing First approach.

Not only does it work, but it’s cost-effective for the chronically homeless population. While people tend to shy away from the Housing First model over claims of high overhead costs, it turns out to be much more cost-efficient in the long run that temporary shelter.

Consider the cost of the average chronically homeless person in an urban area – say, New York City. Between accessing government services, emergency care at hospitals, run-ins with law enforcement, incarceration, and the like – the cost of an average chronically homeless to the state is quite high. Higher, it turns out, than permanent supportive housing – which would not only provide the chronically homeless person the services he/she needs to better their well-being, but remove them from the streets altogether and place them in stable housing.

(I’ve cited this story before, but Malcolm Gladwell, of Blink, Tipping Point, and Outliers fame, wrote a story demonstrating just that called “Million Dollar Murray”.)

Housing First is a definitive, effective, and significant step for a systemic change in the way we approach homelessness – one that has been embraced by advocates and elected officials alike.

And that’s why Housing First.

For more about the Alliance’s take on Housing First – check out our website.

If you attend the National Conference on Ending Homelessness this week, you’ll meet the newest member of our staff Ian Lisman, Senior Program and Policy Analyst on Veterans Homelessness. And if you can’t join us, you can learn a little about him here.

Hello, my name is Ian Lisman, I’m the newest staff member at the National Alliance to End Homelessness. I am working here as the new Senior Program and Policy Analyst on Veterans Homelessness (try saying that three times fast!).

In all seriousness it is an honor and a privilege to be working here at the Alliance.

Before coming to the Alliance I worked in Denver, Colorado as a case manager, then program coordinator/director, for the Homeless Veterans Reintegration Program (HVRP) grant with the Denver Department of Human Services (DDHS) for the City and County of Denver. I have a degree in Human Services with a concentration in counseling and mental health.

Veterans are disproportionally represented among homeless people and this is a national disgrace, especially considering our country is engaged in several ongoing military conflicts. There will be many more service members returning from combat to civilian life with many challenges facing them (fewer job prospects, family issues, mental and physical health issues, etc.). Ending up on the streets should not be one of those issues.

The Alliance has already sent me to the “front lines” of ending veteran homelessness. Fewer than three weeks in and I’ve already met with VA officials, Hill staffers, DOL representatives, think tanks, and other community providers working on ending homelessness.

I have a special place in my heart for my brothers and sisters in arms. I served in the U.S. Army and am a combat veteran of the first Gulf War. I am a member of the Human Services Honor Society, the American Legion, and the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW).

The new emphasis by the current administration to end homelessness, especially homelessness among veterans, gives me hope that our country can come together on this issue. VA Secretary Shinseki stated: “President Obama and I are personally committed to ending homelessness among Veterans within the next five years.  Those who have served this nation as Veterans should never find themselves on the streets, living without care and without hope.”

I agree wholeheartedly.

I look forward to doing my part to ensure that we achieve that goal and look towards a day when all veterans can return to a safe, stable place to call home.

Today’s guest post comes to us from Kate Kelly from Monarch Housing in New Jersey.

On Tuesday, June 21, 2011, Bergen County Community College’s Institute for Public Policy (Paramus, New Jersey) hosted the event which featured an expert panel of presenters including:

• Dr. Sam Tsemberis, founder & CEO, Pathways to Housing;
• Lisa Stand, senior analyst for program and policy, National Alliance to End Homelessness (NAEH);
• Tom Toronto, president, Bergen County’s United Way; and
• Julia Orlando, director, Bergen County Housing, Health and Human Services Center.
• Dr. Ron Milon, Vice President, Bergen Community College, welcomed the audience and Clark Lamendola, president, LaMendola Associates, moderated the expert panel.

Permanent, affordable housing was the dominant theme of the panel presentations. Dr. Tsemberis stressed that small scale solutions are not enough to end homelessness and instead, the Housing First model – affordable housing without the prerequisite of treatment for substance abuse and mental health issues – is the solution.

Lisa Stand highlighted communities across the country that have had success in ending family homelessness by using the rapid re-housing model – moving quickly to get families immediately back into affordable housing. Family homelessness increased slightly last year but more alarmingly, the problem is moving from the cities to the suburbs.

Tom Toronto talked about his visit to the Pathways to Housing program in New York City and how the Housing First model could successfully be implemented in New Jersey.

And lastly, Julia Orlando described how the Bergen County Center works locally to end homelessness in the County. The agency’s first goal is to obtain permanent housing – everyone who walks through the Center’s doors is evaluated for housing.
Attendees responded to the panel with a variety of questions.

The forum was prompted by College President Dr. G. Jeremiah Ryan’s shock and dismay over the lack of attention given to homelessness in one of America’s most affluent counties. Bergen County, New Jersey is the 21st most affluent county in the U.S. Yet, over the course of last year, an estimated 942 Bergen residents – our neighbors – went to sleep without a roof over their heads.

You can view videos from the event on the Monarch Housing website.

Today’s guest post comes from Alliance Vice President of Programs and Policy Steve Berg.

Bob Hohler, Executive Director of the Melville Charitable Trust, passed away suddenly while hiking with his family in England last Thursday, June 2.

For two decades Mr. Hohler worked tirelessly and gracefully behind the scenes to help establish the Melville Trust as a courageous leader in the philanthropic community, moving the country toward a solution to homelessness.  He was also the Chairman of the Board and a founder of Funders Together to End Homelessness; and a leader on the boards of several nonprofits in Connecticut with which the Melville Trust is involved.

Prior to his role at Melville, Mr. Hohler enjoyed a long career as an activist in the civil rights and anti-war movements, as a lay minister, and as an anti-poverty fighter.  A native of South Boston, he grew up in extreme poverty, leading him to understand first-hand the struggles of those he set out to help.

Mr. Hohler did his work with a keen commitment to justice, and an equally strong commitment to concrete results.  He never shied away from honest anger, but was always ready to extend a hand.  His tireless work, his positive outlook, and his concern for everyone who is part of this movement made him a hero.  Hundreds of thousand of Americans, living tonight in modest apartments instead of on the streets and in shelters, testify to the strength of his legacy.  His legacy will inspire us, in memory, to never quit.

Our thoughts and prayers are with his family, the Melville family, and to all who will feel a gap in our lives and our work at the loss.  We will all do our best to live by his example and fill that gap.

For more information about Bob Hohler, please see the obituary in the Connecticut Mirror.

Photo courtesy of the Melville Charitable Trust.