The city has started small with a “Housing First” approach to homelessness—moving 80 people experiencing homelessness into supportive housing in recent months.
A new pilot program in New York City “is moving 80 formerly street-homeless New Yorkers into vacant supportive housing units while bypassing a series of grueling and time-consuming bureaucratic hurdles,” according to an article by David Brand for City Limits.
New York Mayor Eric Adams announced the new pilot program earlier in November, after launching in September. Four single-room occupancy (SRO) buildings in Brooklyn and Manhattan run by the nonprofit Volunteers of America-Greater New York (VOA-GNY) are providing the facilities for the city’s foray into “Housing First” homelessness policies.
“A growing body of research shows that Housing First is effective for reducing homelessness and keeping people stably housed,” explains Brand.
Mayor Adams is pushing the pilot program as a test of the concept. Advocates say Housing First is tested and effective (as evidenced most famously, arguably, by Houston), and the city should be working harder to fill its vacant supportive housing units.
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