NPACH: The National Policy and Advocacy Council on Homelessness

Yesterday, at a town hall meeting in Tampa, President Obama responded to a question about what could be done to help provide ex drug felons with jobs, so that they would not return to a life of crime, by touting the Second Chance Act. NPACH worked diligently with a bipartisan group of advocates and Members of Congress to pass this legislation, to help ensure that people leaving jails and prisons do not become homeless because they cannot rent an apartment or find work.

Our partners at NAEHCY have recently released a report detailing the ways in which school districts and staff can help provide housing for homeless youth, to help keep them stably enrolled in school through graduation. The report provides recommendations to districts interested in establishing housing programs, and offers great examples of existing programs that have used American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) or "stimulus" funding, HUD McKinney-Vento housing money, and other creative sources of funding to put youth in housing.

Read the report here.

On Thursday, November 19, US Senators Patty Murray and Al Franken introduced the "Educational Success for Children and Youth Without Homes Act of 2009," S. 2800, and the "Fostering Success in Education Act of 2009," S. 2801. These bills would improve current federal law that ensures that children and youth who are homeless or in foster care have their educational rights protected.

Ensuring that homeless children and youth can enroll in school and succeed academically and socially is a critical focus of NPACH's efforts. That is why we are proud to endorse and publicize the important work of our partners at the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth (NAEHCY).

Please help us ensure that your Senators support this important legislation. For more details on how to take action, visit the NAEHCY website.

At a meeting on Monday, October 19, the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness appointed a new Executive Director. The new ED will be Barbara Poppe, who currently serves as the Executive director of the Community Shelter Board in Columbus, Ohio - an umbrella organization that oversees housing and services programs for homeless persons in Columbus.

We welcome Ms. Poppe to her new role, and look forward to working productively with the Council to ensure that federal efforts to end homelessness are properly coordinated. Our views on how to make this happen were laid out in a memo sent to the Obama transition team. Many of these recommendations have already been implemented - others remain to be accomplished. We will discuss these views with Executive Director Poppe once she officially begins her work.

We have long focused significant effort on monitoring the Interagency Council. We've raised strong objections to the Council's singular focus on "chronic" homelessness and its effort to place responsibility for ending homelessness on state and local government and local service providers, while downplaying the role of the federal government. We've exposed the Council's focus on travel and photo opportunities over substantive work. And we've criticized the Council's refusal to put a meaningful focus on ending homelessness for children, youth, and families. We hope and expect that the Council will change course and address these concerns under its new leadership.

Citing the Foreclosure to Homelessness report released this summer by NPACH and a group of national homelessness advocacy organizations, the New York Times reported yesterday on former homeowners who, after losing their housing due to a foreclosure, are now homeless.

The story relates the reality of homelessness today -- that it can often involve staying with friends and family, or living in motels, for both brief and lengthy periods of time. In doing so, it provides support for our view that the HUD definition of homelessness must reflect these living situations. We look forward to HUD's upcoming release of new draft regulations regarding the definition of homelessness as amended in last spring's HEARTH Act -- our comments will be focused on ensuring that communities have the maximum possible flexibility to cover people in their area who are truly without housing.