CEO Corner: Week of November 3

A big part of my job is talking to people at all levels of the homeless services sector, as well as across many other sectors. And while right now I am hearing a lot of support for the advocacy work happening around the Continuum of Care Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) in particular, I am also hearing concerns that decisions being made in the federal government aren’t as dire as reported. That maybe we are crying wolf.

We are not.

I get that it’s easy to think that way – to downplay what could be coming because it is too hard to wrap your head around. To be honest, I have a hard time wrapping my own head around more than 170,000 people losing their housing and supports, or a NOFO being issued this late in the year. It just doesn’t make any sense to slash the very programs that keep seniors, families with children, young people, and people living with disabling conditions stably housed, especially in a very tight housing market. As a field, we have never been in a situation where ANY administration has proposed changes that would do this kind of harm to people who have overcome homelessness and who are gaining stability.    

So I want to be extremely clear: This is not a false alarm. We are not crying wolf. And, if we are ultimately successful in changing the harmful trajectory of these decisions it is because advocates, providers, and impacted people all over the country used their voices to make Members of Congress aware of the damage these decisions will cause to real people. It’s not because the threat isn’t real.

The Alliance’s Role in This Moment

Coming into this year, the team at the Alliance knew that there would be any number of threats coming from the Administration. But we have understood that this moment calls on us to remain consistent, disciplined, and measured. We have been very conscientious about remaining calm and sounding the alarm only for threats that present the greatest chance of harm, with thegoal of ensuring you have the information that you need to make informed decisions.

The Alliance’s perspective on proposed or current federal changes is informed by our relationships, past experiences in and out of government, and by paying close attention to what has unfolded since January. The reporting from POLITICO served as validation for our concerns. And our experience tells us that there is no way that the Administration’s plan can go forward without causing extreme funding gaps and disruption in services. It is quite literally impossible.

What’s Really at Stake

For the last two decades, the homelessness sector has intentionally moved away from stairstep approaches to homelessness that separate people into categories of deserving and undeserving. Congress agreed that these approaches were ineffective and outdated when passing the 2009 HEARTH Act, which amended the McKinney-Vento Act and prioritized permanent housing and system-wide performance to move the needle in the right direction.

The changes being introduced by this Administration – and which HUD plans to implement through the upcoming NOFO – would set progress back decades and will result in even more alarming increases in homelessness.

The impacts of this NOFO, even just the impacts caused by the severe delays at this point in time, will be large scale and long-lasting. This isn’t just about federal funds. States and local governments are already under immense pressure to fill the funding gaps the federal government is creating in other areas like disaster recovery, food security, and health care. The additional gaps and disruption created by this NOFO will add to this demand on state and local governments and will be especially damaging for rural states, who rely more heavily on the federal government for funding these areas.

Layer on top of this the likely changes that HUD will demand with virtually no time to adequately plan and you have a worst-case scenario on your hands.  

At the end of the day, we are talking about more than grants and money and paperwork. We are talking about hundreds of thousands of people’s lives: people who have overcome homelessness and many other obstacles to get into housing, and all those who are still sleeping outside because there already is not enough to help get them home.  

Taking a Deep Breath – and Keeping On

This is a difficult moment. But it’s also full of opportunity.

There is an opportunity to grow our collective advocacy networks in ways that we have always needed.

There is an opportunity to reimagine how we do this work: how we can advance new and innovative solutions to homelessness, and continue to lift up the ones that work.

There is an opportunity to foster new leaders. I am seeing them emerge in new ways, and incredibly determined to do this work.

There is an opportunity to become stronger and more united than ever.

And no matter what, there is always an opportunity to do what we know is right: to serve people with dignity and compassion, to advocate for the funding to keep people alive, to show up to our work every day committed to end homelessness.

And I know we’ll take it.