The number of homeless individuals in the U.S. has increased by 18% since last year, reaching its highest point since 2007. However, veteran homelessness has fallen to a record low, highlighting the success of the 'Housing First' approach.
It seems only fitting that a year like 2024 should end with one last bleak milestone. Late last week, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development released the top line numbers from its annual “point-in-time” homeless count, conducted on a single night last January. The headline makes for grim reading: Homelessness appears to have risen by 18% since last year, to the highest level since HUD began collecting this data in 2007.
In other words, America’s already historic homelessness crisis has only become worse over the past several years. Yet, HUD did register one bright spot in the darkness: Homelessness among military veterans has fallen to a record low. The story of how this happened can tell us a lot about what we need to do in order to end the larger crisis. Though public efforts to combat homelessness receive some federal support, they tend to be coordinated at the local or regional level — if they are coordinated at all. Not so with efforts to house the homeless veteran population, which are overseen by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. The VA follows an approach known as “Housing First,” which is exactly what it sounds like: program beneficiaries receive unconditional offers of permanent housing, along with access to voluntary “wraparound” services such as mental health care and addiction counseling. Housing First is best understood in contrast with older “treatment first” models that treat permanent housing as a reward for submitting to treatment and exhibiting good behavior. A treatment first program may first transition an unsheltered person who struggles with addiction from the street into a shelter or sobering center, then require that person to demonstrate sobriety and “readiness” to receive permanent housing. A Housing First program will simply move that individual directly into permanent housing, on the assumption that someone who is stably housed has a better shot at defeating — or at least managing — their other personal demon
Homelessness Veteran Homelessness Housing First Social Crisis US Department Of Housing And Urban Development
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