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Mayor Lee Announces New Housing for Chronically Homeless Veterans

Mayor Lee Announces New Housing for Chronically Homeless Veterans

New supportive housing buildings will provide essential housing opportunities for chronically homeless veterans and will move San Francisco closer to ending chronic homelessness for veterans

 

Mayor Edwin M. Lee and Jeff Kositsky, Director of the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH) announced today the City’s plan to end chronic homelessness for veterans in San Francisco.
“No one who has served our country should be homeless in our City and these 75 new units will bring us one step closer to eradicating this situation,” said Mayor Lee. “Over the last two years we have housed over 700 chronically homeless vets and we are committed to continuing this work. Chronic veteran homelessness has no place in San Francisco.”

In 2014 First Lady Michelle Obama challenged cities across the country to end veterans’ homelessness. San Francisco accepted this challenge and has made important progress toward the goal of ending chronic homelessness for veterans, housing over 700 homeless veterans in the last two years.  There are approximately 300 more chronically homeless veterans to house in San Francisco.

This fall and winter San Francisco will open 75 new units of supportive housing for veterans. Supportive Housing is a nationally recognized best practice in ending chronic homelessness that combines long term affordability with onsite social services ensuring that residents can maintain their housing and improve their health.  The additional 75 units of supportive housing will cut the number of homeless vets living on our streets and shelters to 225.

“By making important improvements to our system, prioritizing housing placements for highly vulnerable veterans, and with the continued support and commitment of all local and federal partners, I am confident that San Francisco can end chronic homelessness for veterans,” said Kositsky.

The Crown Hotel at 528 Valencia Street opened on October 27th with 50 new units of supportive housing, 30 of which will house veterans.  The Winton hotel at 445 O’Farrell Street is slated to open this fall and will include 104 new units, including 45 units for veterans.  The Crown Hotel and the Winton Hotel will be managed by the Tenderloin Housing Clinic (THC).

“The Tenderloin Housing Clinic is excited to partner with the Department of Homelessness and Supportive housing on these supportive housing buildings.  Together we’re making great strides in ending chronic homelessness for veterans and can’t wait to welcome the vets to their new homes in the very popular 16th and Valencia Street neighborhood, the improving Mid-Market, and less than a block from the Hilton in an exciting part of the Tenderloin,” said Randy Shaw, Executive Director of the Tenderloin Housing Clinic.

One of our most successful measures to house chronically homeless veterans in our community was the opening of 250 Kearny Street, a supportive housing project that houses 126 chronically homeless individuals with a combination of federal and local resources.  We are replicating the success of 250 Kearny this fall and winter at the new sites that will open: the Crown, and the Winton.

These projects demonstrate our ability to house homeless veterans in the community.  By leveraging federal housing programs like HUD-VASH and Shelter Plus Care together with local resources we can provide the long term affordable housing and support services that veterans need to exit homelessness and thrive.

Ending chronic homelessness for veterans will require a community wide effort that calls on private landlords and management companies, nonprofit organizations, and local and federal government to come together to put the needs of highly vulnerable veterans at the forefront of our work. Our recent success is due to our strong partnerships with the San Francisco Housing Authority, the US Department of Veterans Affairs, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, and our City’s talented service providers.

On November 17 the Homes for Heroes collaborative will be hosting a landlord engagement event at City Hall to recruit private landlords to join the fight to end chronic veteran homelessness.  The Homes for Heroes collaborative includes the City, the US Department of Veterans Affairs, the San Francisco Housing Authority and local nonprofit partners.  To learn more and to rsvp please visit: http://bit.ly/landlordengagement

 

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About the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing: The Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH) aims to prevent homelessness when possible and end homelessness for people experiencing homelessness through the provision of coordinated, compassionate and high-quality services.  Established in 2016, HSH consolidates and coordinates citywide homeless serving programs and contracts.

About Tenderloin Housing Clinic: The Tenderloin Housing Clinic’s mission is to prevent tenant displacement, preserve and expand the City’s low cost housing stock and to provide comprehensive legal assistance to low income tenants. The Clinic is successful in fulfilling this mission by providing free legal services, securing SRO units through the Master Lease program and offering comprehensive support services to our clients.

S.F. Needs More Landlords to Rent to Homeless Veterans

S.F. Needs More Landlords to Rent to Homeless Veterans

San Francisco Chronicle

By Leon Winston

November 10, 2016

We have seen an unprecedented focus on homelessness in San Francisco this past year from The Chronicle-led SF Homeless Project media coverage, the creation of the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, and numerous ballot initiatives. Homelessness has long been a divisive issue, and is even more so now because of the rapid rise in housing costs. I often hear that we need to shake up the system and innovate our way to new solutions to address homelessness. From my perspective, we know the answers; we have to act.

San Francisco has had a rich history with the military and welcoming veterans to our city. Now as a community, we must work to create more housing opportunities and ensure that no veteran is left, forgotten, on our streets. We need more landlords to consider renting to veterans.

I have heard, read and been actively involved in countless proposals to end veteran homelessness. My organization has worked since 1974 to end homelessness and poverty among veterans. I have spent my career helping my veteran peers. I’ll be the first to admit there is no silver bullet. That said, a “housing first” approach is starting to work.

In late 2009, the White House and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs announced an audacious goal: to end veteran homelessness by the end of 2015. Few people believed we could achieve it. Nevertheless, we launched a coordinated effort in San Francisco with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the San Francisco VA Medical Center, the San Francisco Housing Authority, real estate developers, landlords, and other nonprofits like Swords to Plowshares.

We opened new housing sites and sent our outreach teams onto the streets to bring hundreds of veterans into supportive housing. We were up against tremendous odds.

Affordable housing is scarce. Our veteran population is typically older, earns less, and is more disabled than non-veterans of similar age and situation. Today, we have housed more than 40 percent of homeless veterans in San Francisco despite a 20 percent increase in the overall rate of homelessness during that time. Our work is far from done.

Click here to read the full op-ed.

New Housing for the Homeless Opens on Valencia

New Housing for the Homeless Opens on Valencia

 

Mission Local 
November 3, 2016 
By

 

San Francisco’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing announced Wednesday that 244 new permanent supportive housing units will come online over the next three months – 50 of them in the Mission District.

 

Valencia Street’s Crown Hotel, where units came online October 27 and prospective tenants are currently viewing its apartments, is one of three hotels now becoming available to help house people living on the streets and in shelters. The others will open later this year, and all three are managed by the Tenderloin Housing Clinic.

 

The units are aimed at housing individuals who have been homeless for a year or more and have disabling conditions, with some units reserved for veterans. Tenants are selected through a local coordinated entry program for federally subsidized units, and residents pay a third of their income, no matter the income.

 

In supportive housing units, residents have access not just to a permanent roof over their heads but on-site social services – which include case management to help tenants access entitlement benefits, health care, or even education depending on their needs.

 

Click here to read the full article. 

SF’s New Plan to Get Homeless Families Off the Streets

SF’s new plan to get homeless families off the streets

San Francisco Chronicle
By Heather Knight
October 29, 2016

 

In one of the wealthiest cities in the world, these are startling statistics.

 

There are 1,303 homeless families in San Francisco’s public schools with a total of 2,097 children, more than double the total nine years ago. Fifteen families, including 20 children, live in tents or cars on the city’s streets.

 

Mayors and supervisors have long prioritized solving homelessness for single adults — those grizzled guys we see every day with their cardboard signs and shopping carts — because they’re far more visible and bothersome to residents and tourists. Families are fewer, hidden away and easier to ignore.

That’s changing under San Francisco’s new Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, which by next summer will have a new way of dealing with family homelessness. The goal is that by 2020, every family in San Francisco that becomes homeless will be housed within 90 days.

 

The short-term goal is to ensure that those families living in the most dire of conditions — tents and cars — get immediate access to emergency shelter. Those with a roof over their heads, such as a motel room or a relative’s house, will get help finding stable housing while bypassing emergency shelter.

 

There also will be one data system holding the family’s information and one entry point for services. Currently, families bounce around among government agencies and nonprofits, telling their often traumatic stories up to 15 times before getting help. There are three data systems that store their information, and it isn’t shared.

 

Click here to read the full article.

Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing Announcement: Kerry Abbott Hired as Deputy Director of Programs

Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing Announcement:
Kerry Abbott Hired as Deputy Director of Programs

 

On November 1, 2016 Kerry Abbott will join the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing (HSH) as the Deputy Director for Programs.  Kerry will fill the position being vacated by the retirement of Joyce Crum, the current Deputy Director for Programs.

 

Kerry has been involved with the development and implementation of affordable housing and services throughout her career.  She is a thought leader in the movement to end homelessness and has supported numerous organizations and municipalities in strengthening their health and homeless response systems.  As the founder and principle of Abbott Consulting she has assisted agencies providing housing, health care, and supportive services to formerly homeless people and other special needs populations. She is deeply familiar with the work of nonprofit developers, government agencies, and service providers.

 

Before launching her consulting practice, Kerry spent more than fifteen years in non-profit executive management, working with supportive and affordable housing providers and social service and advocacy organizations. She served as Deputy Director of the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, Executive Director of City Housing, Inc., and Program Director at the General Assistance Advocacy Project.  At THC she oversaw the property management, support services, money management, human resources, and financial functions of the organization.

 

In her role as Deputy Director for Programs Kerry will be responsible for overseeing all housing and supportive service programs under HSH. She and her team will be responsible for implementing many components of HSH’s strategic framework including the shelter system, supportive housing programs, rapid re-housing, homelessness prevention, and encampment resolution.

 

HSH is thrilled to welcome Kerry Abbott to the team and to the City family.

 

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