The Biden administration released on December 19 a federal plan for ending homelessness in the U.S., All In: The Federal Strategic Plan to Prevent and End Homelessness. Developed by the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) in collaboration with 19 federal agencies comprising the USICH council, the plan outlines strategies to prevent homelessness and increase the supply of housing with supportive services and announces the ambitious goal of reducing homelessness by 25% by 2025. The administration encourages state and local governments to use the new plan as a blueprint for developing their own plans to prevent and end homelessness and for defining their own goals for 2025.
All In seeks to prevent homelessness systematically and combat the systemic racism that has created racial and ethnic disparities in homelessness. The plan is centered around six pillars: three foundations – equity, data and evidence, and collaboration – and three solutions – housing and supports, crisis response, and prevention. The plan outlines strategies and actions under each pillar that lay the groundwork for a future when no one experiences homelessness. The plan was shaped by robust public input from more than 500 people who have experienced homelessness, as well as leaders, providers, advocates, developers, and other partners from more than 600 communities, tribes, and territories.
All In recommits the federal government to proven strategies to end homelessness, including Housing First. The Housing First model is the most effective approach for ending homelessness for individuals and families. Housing First treats people with dignity, provides personalized care that addresses the unique needs of individuals, and recognizes that without housing, every other aspect of a person’s life suffers.
The release of the plan coincides with the week of Homeless Person’s Memorial Day, which commemorates the people who have lost their lives while living unhoused. All In addresses homelessness as a life-or-death crisis rooted in housing and health problems – not a crime for the justice system to solve. As homelessness has become more visible in communities across the country, there has been an alarming increase in the number of state and local laws that criminalize homelessness and punish it with fines, jail time, or both. Criminalization is counterproductive and makes the process of exiting homelessness even more difficult. The new plan serves to develop effective alternatives to criminalization.
All In builds on the success of the Obama administration’s efforts to prevent and reduce homelessness, including the use of strategies that resulted in a significant drop in homelessness between 2010 and 2016. Some of those gains were reversed between 2016 and the beginning of the pandemic due to a rejection of evidence-based strategies, like Housing First. Coinciding with the release of the new plan, HUD released new data on December 19 demonstrating that further increases in homelessness were largely avoided despite the COVID-19 public health and economic crisis, primarily due to the Biden administration’s response, including the federal eviction moratorium, emergency rental assistance, and additional resources provided through the “American Rescue Plan Act” (ARPA). The House America initiative, which leverages federal support provided through ARPA, is on track to permanently house more than 100,000 people experiencing homelessness and add more than 20,000 units of affordable housing into the pipeline by the end of 2022.
The White House and USICH also announced on December 19 a new initiative to help cities and states reduce unsheltered homelessness. In early 2023, the White House and USICH will begin working with a cohort of geographically diverse communities to help improve and accelerate their efforts to house people experiencing homelessness. USICH will host webinars in 2023 – starting in January – to support partners and communities in using All In to develop local and systems-level plans to prevent and end homelessness, develop goals to reduce homelessness by 2025, hold the federal government accountable, and learn more about federal programs and strategies to prevent and end homelessness.
“Housing should be treated as a human right,” said USICH Executive Director Jeff Olivet. “Many Americans ask, ‘Is it possible to end homelessness?’ The answer is, yes, the United States can end homelessness by fixing systems – not by blaming the people being failed by them. With All In, the Biden-Harris administration outlined a set of strategies and actions for doing just that. Now we must scale what works and develop new and creative solutions to build a future where no one experiences the tragedy and indignity of homelessness – and everyone has a safe, stable, accessible, and affordable home.”
Learn more about the Federal Strategic Plan at: https://www.usich.gov/fsp
Read All In: The Federal Strategic Plan to Prevent and End Homelessness at: https://bit.ly/3WwlMMG
Learn more about Housing First at: https://bit.ly/3Vb35gm