Metro Jacksonville

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Nov 6, 2014
FromCommunity Solutions
Community Solutions Announces Selection of 67 Communities to Participate in Zero: 2016
National initiative will help communities end chronic and veteran homelessness

November 6, 2014 -- Community Solutions announced today that it has selected 67 communities to participate in Zero: 2016, a national campaign to end veteran and chronic homelessness in the next two years. The organization said it would work intensively with these communities to meet the federal goals set by President Obama to end veteran homelessness by Dec. 2015 and chronic homelessness by Dec. 2016. The initiative, made possible by the support of generous sponsors, including Deutsche Bank, Got Your 6, The Home Depot Foundation, and JP Morgan Chase, is a rigorous follow-on to the group's successful 100,000 Homes Campaign, which announced in June that it had helped communities house 105,000 chronically homeless Americans in under four years. (A full list of Zero: 2016 communities can be found at the end of this release.)

Zero: 2016 will formally launch in January of 2015, when the majority of communities participating say they will walk their streets block by block to survey each of their homeless neighbors during the national 2015 Homeless Point-in-Time Count. Communities will use this information to develop by-name files on each person experiencing homelessness on their streets -- a strategy designed to help communities connect people to available subsidies and appropriate housing options as quickly as possible.

Participating communities will seek to accelerate their housing efforts through four key areas of work: closing the research-to-practice gap, real-time data and performance management, local systems redesign and local leadership development. Community Solutions will provide hands-on coaching and data tools, and will curate a national peer-to-peer learning network to accelerate innovation across communities.

"Chronic and Veteran homelessness are urgent, solvable problems," said Beth Sandor, Director of Zero: 2016 for Community Solutions. "These communities represent a potential tipping point. If they can show that getting to zero is possible, we think it will become untenable for other communities not to follow suit. Zero: 2016 is about bringing shared accountability to this work. Participants are making a public commitment to get to zero on time, and they will use that commitment to drive measurable progress."

This announcement comes on the heels of the 2014 Homeless Point-in-Time Count, released last week by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which showed that homelessness continues to decline across virtually all major categories. According to the report, communities selected to join Zero: 2016 account for a combined 31,669 chronically homeless Americans and 16,218 homeless veterans. Community Solutions estimates an overlap of 9,000-12,000 between these groups.

The 67 communities selected for Zero: 2016 represent 30 different states and the District of Columbia. Among them are 51 communities who also participated in the 100,000 Homes Campaign and 16 new communities. Combined, the group represents the joint, public commitment of 234 housing authorities, local government entities, non-profit organizations and community agencies. Five states (Connecticut, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Utah and West Virginia) were selected to participate as full states.

Zero: 2016 dovetails with other large-scale initiatives helping communities end homelessness, including the 25 Cities Initiative, led by the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Mayor's Challenge to End Homelessness, championed by First Lady Michelle Obama. Many communities selected to join Zero: 2016 are also participating in one or both of these initiatives, and Community Solutions has coordinated extensively with the federal government to ensure that these efforts complement each other well.



Selected Communities:

Communities applied by Continuums of Care (CoCs), the 414 local groups set up to administer HUD funding to end homelessness in each region of the country.

    Arizona:
        Tucson/Pima County CoC



    California:
        Sacramento City & County CoC
        Richmond/Contra Costa County CoC
        Watsonville/Santa Cruz City & County CoC
        Fresno/Madera County CoC
        Los Angeles City & County CoC
        San Diego City and County CoC
        Santa Maria/Santa Barbara County CoC
        Bakersfield/Kern County CoC
        Riverside City & County CoC



    State of Connecticut – Full State:
        (Includes Hartford CoC, City of Waterbury CoC, Bridgeport/Fairfield/Stratford CoC, Norwalk/Fairfield County CoC, Stamford Greenwich CoC & Connecticut Balance of State CoC)

    District of Columbia CoC



    Florida:
        Big Bend CoC
        Jacksonville/Duval/Clay/Nassau Counties CoC
        Miami/Dade County CoC
        Ft Lauderdale/Broward County CoC
        Ft Myers/Cape Coral/Lee County CoC
        West Palm Beach/Palm Beach County CoC



    Georgia:
        Columbus-Muscogee/Russell County CoC



    Hawaii:
        Honolulu CoC



    Illinois:
        Rockford/Winnebago, Boone Counties CoC
        Waukegan/North Chicago/Lake County CoC
        Chicago CoC
        Cook County CoC



    Kansas:
        Kansas City/Wyandotte County CoC
        Wichita/Sedgwick County CoC



    Kentucky:
        Louisville/Jefferson County CoC



    Louisiana:
        Shreveport/Bossier/Northwest CoC
        New Orleans/Jefferson Parish CoC



    Massachusetts:
        Cape Cod/Islands CoC
        Springfield/Chicopee/Holyoke/Westfield/Hampden County CoC



    Maryland:
        Montgomery County CoC



    Michigan:
        Detroit CoC
        Pontiac/Royal Oak/Oakland County CoC
        Flint/Genesee County CoC
        Ann Arbor/Washtenaw County CoC



    Missouri:
        Kansas City/Independence/Lee's Summit/Jackson County CoC



    Mississippi:
        Jackson/Rankin, Madison Counties CoC
        Gulf Port/Gulf Coast Regional CoC



    North Carolina:
        Winston Salem/Forsyth County CoC
        Greensboro/High Point CoC
        Charlotte/Mecklenberg CoC



    Nebraska:
        Omaha/Council Bluffs CoC



    New Jersey:
        Bergen County CoC



    State of New Mexico – Full State:
        (Includes Albuquerque CoC & New Mexico Balance of State CoC)



    Ohio:
        Ohio Balance of State CoC



    Oklahoma:
        Tulsa City & County/Broken Arrow CoC
        Oklahoma City CoC
        Norman/Cleveland County CoC



    Pennsylvania:
        Lancaster City & County CoC



    State of Rhode Island – Full State:
        (Rhode Island CoC)



    South Carolina:
        Charleston/Low Country CoC
        Columbia/Midlands CoC



    Tennessee:
        Chattanooga/Southeast Tennessee CoC
        Memphis/Shelby County CoC
        Nashville/Davidson County CoC



    Texas:
        San Antonio/Bexar County CoC
        Dallas City & County/Irving CoC
        Fort Worth/Arlington/Tarrant County CoC



    State of Utah – Full State:
        (Includes Salt Lake City & County CoC, Provo/Mountainland CoC & Utah Balance of State CoC)



    Virginia:
        Richmond/Henrico, Chesterfield, Hanover Counties CoC
        Roanoke City & County/Salem CoC
        Portsmouth CoC
        Virginia Balance of State CoC
        Arlington County CoC



    Wisconsin:
        Madison/Dane County CoC



    State of West Virginia – Full State:
        (Includes Huntington/Cabell, Wayne Counties CoC, Charleston/Kanawha, Putnam, Boone, Clay Counties CoC & West Virginia Balance of State CoC)



Community Solutions is a national non-profit dedicated to helping communities solve the complex social problems facing their most vulnerable residents. The organization's work applies design thinking, quality improvement and a host of other cross-sector disciplines to issues like homelessness, unemployment, and public health. Zero: 2016 is a rigorous follow-on to the organization's successful 100,000 Homes Campaign designed to help a select group of communities end chronic and veteran homelessness in the next two years. The initiative will formally launch in January 2015.