Homeless to Homes

The Cincinnati/Hamilton County Continuum of Care for the Homeless delivered the new Homeless to Homes plan to City Council and Mayor Mallory on April 15, 2009.

The new report recommends significant changes aimed at helping homeless people successfully move to appropriate housing, including changes to the emergency shelter system, more transitional and permanent housing options, and new cooperative efforts among funders.

Read the full report here.

Last fall, City Council asked for a plan to help us create a new system in which the homeless can move to homes and become productive members of the community. The Homeless to Homes initiative's goal is to insure the highest standards of care for the homeless, while also making sure that new housing facilities for the homeless are good neighbors to the surrounding community.

City Council asked the CoC to take a "blank slate" approach and designing from the ground up a new system that would substantially decrease the number of homeless persons requiring shelter services each night.

The plan includes new standards for homeless providers, and new expectations for those who are homeless.

The report recommends:

A higher level of service system-wide to move individuals out of homelessness quickly.
An ambitious increase in transitional and permanent supportive housing, with a workable strategy for its development.
Targeted services, specific to the individual's gender, age, or special needs, with reduced reliance on emergency shelter
Clear accountabilities of and actions for social services agencies, the business community, local government, funders, and homeless people alike for the good of those who are homeless and the whole community

The next step is passage of a council ordinance to establish a transition team that will prioritize the report's recommendations, work to implement the recommendations in a way that does not cause additional hardships for homeless individuals or result in an increase in street homelessness, and provide City staff and financial support and coordination to implement the recommendations.

The report was written with the input of all key community stakeholders, including homeless providers, the mental health and substance abuse services providers, the business community, government representatives, funding entities, national and regional experts and others.

The CoC is one of the top-scoring CoC programs in the country. It has a reputation for effective planning, implementation and innovation, with overall outcomes that exceed national expectations. Since 1996, the City and Hamilton County have partnered around the CoC 's efforts to plan and implement a comprehensive, effective service and housing delivery system for the homeless that includes street outreach, individual and family emergency shelters, transitional and permanent housing, and services-only programs.

Download: Council Ordinance