Santa Clara County Launches Plan To Finish Household Homelessness In 4 Years – CBS San Francisco

SAN JOSE (BCN) – Santa Clara County officials are working with nonprofit housing partners and the City of San Jose to house 1,200 homeless families next year.

The program that started on Monday is called HEADING HOME. It uses federal grants that will cover rent for homeless families for the next decade.

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“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity with a new infusion of resources,” said San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo at a press conference Monday.

The county estimates that 600 families are currently homeless – so they will be the first to receive grants and be housed. A little less than 40 percent of these families live in San Jose, Liccardo said.

But even if the county is home to these 600 already homeless families, officials assume that 600 more families will become homeless in the next year – hence the number of 1200.

“We have to do more than just help the people who are outside,” said Ray Bramson, Destination Home’s chief operating officer. “These are hard-working parents, victims and survivors of domestic violence, pregnant mothers just looking for a home.”

Bramson went on to say that about 40 percent of homeless parents work full-time but cannot keep up with rising housing costs in the Bay Area.

And 70 percent of uninhabited families are single female heads of households, with 62 percent self-reporting that they have children in Santa Clara County, according to the district.

California homeless data found that Santa Clara has nearly 2,700 homeless residents under the age of 18 – the majority in all Bay Area counties.

“Every child in our ward deserves to thrive, and that starts with a home,” said district chairwoman Cindy Chavez.

And the numbers could be even higher as many women deliberately avoid being homeless for fear that their children will be taken away from them.

Supervisor Susan Ellenberg said she heard this story over and over during her tenure as supervisor.

During her tours of the local camps, she learned that unaccomodated mothers were hiding their newborns “to prevent them from receiving critical early care because they feared they would be branded as unfit parents and their children removed from them.”

“Being homeless is not a crime and living in poverty should not be a reason to separate families,” said Ellenberg. “Our residents should not live in constant fear of being torn away by their loved ones because of their housing situation or lack of it. We have an overdue obligation to remove the stigma. “

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The aim of HEADING HOME is to achieve a “functional zero” in five years, ie the number of housing agencies for families in the district is higher than the number of families who become homeless.

To achieve this goal, the county and its partners would need to focus on four main components, according to local leaders.

The first is to find landlords willing to take part in the 10 year home voucher program to accommodate a homeless family.

These coupons come directly from the federal government. Most will be a fixed market rate, with some flexibility to allocate additional funding, Branson said.

The second aspect is to expand the county rapid relocation program, which offers temporary subsidies and case management, to 200 more families annually.

And the third aspect is to expand the county’s homeless prevention strategies to 2,500 households by 2025.

Funding for expanding such programs comes from a variety of sources, Bramson said. Governor Gavin Newsom’s $ 12 billion investment to tackle homelessness brings a new inflow of money from the state. The county also receives additional federal dollars as well as support from nonprofits, philanthropists, and other private entities.

“Right now unprecedented funding and resources are coming from the state,” said Bramson. “We don’t know exactly what all the dollars will look like because they come to us, but we know there will be a void. So we need more than just government funding to make this possible. “

And the final aspect of the HEADING HOME plan is to continue creating affordable and supportive housing by funding Measure A.

Bramson, along with local voters, called on the community to donate to support these efforts. The call to action, however, was aimed primarily at landlords.

“(The vouchers mean) less sales for your properties and a stable home for new tenants,” said Ellenberg. “So please look out for more information from the landlord.”

The supervisor went on to say that more information about the program will be released in the coming weeks. Until then, the district is working with non-profit housing companies to identify a location for the 10-year residential vouchers and immediately start placing the families who are not housed in homes.

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