Congratulations to the Mercer Alliance to End Homelessness on receiving the 2012 Mercer Regional Chamber of Commerce’s Community Impact Award!
The video features community partners and formerly homeless people who share what the Mercer Alliance’s work around rapid re-housing, housing first and other initiatives have meant to them and the greater Mercer County community.
Please Save the Date for the Supportive Housing Association of New Jersey’s (SHA) 14th Annual NJ Supportive Housing Conference. The conference, entitled “Supportive Housing: the Key to Independence” will be held on Friday, December 7, 2012 at The Pines Manor in Edison.
Keynote Speaker: Scott Trudo, “Live Your Passion”
SHA is eager to receive proposals for this year’s conference workshops.
Please click here for more information and to download the application.
Click here for more information about SHA.
The United States Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) has announced its new regional field staff team. The agency welcomes four new regional homeless coordinators: Michael DeVos, Matthew Doherty, Beverley Ebersold, and Amy Sawyer.
In our region, Laura Zellinger will continue in her role as Director of National Programs and Field Support, while also covering New York and New Jersey.
USICH’s regional homeless coordinators serve as principal representatives and points of contact for USICH in the field. These coordinators play instrumental roles in encouraging State and local coordination to achieve the four goals in Opening Doors.
The regional coordinators will engage local and state officials, as well as other community stakeholders to apply proven strategic practices, maximize resources, and advance full implementation of Opening Doors’ strategies to reach national and community goals of preventing and ending homelessness. USICH’s regional coordinators are building upon the work by their predecessors in communities across the country.
Click here for more information.
Please take a minute today to urge your Representative to co-sponsor H.R. 3619 to ensure that tenants continue to be protected at foreclosure.
Representative Keith Ellison (D-MN) has introduced legislation, the Permanently Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act (H.R. 3619), that would make 2009’s Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act (PTFA) permanent law. Specifically, the bill would:
If Congress does not take action to extend the law, the PTFA will expire on December 31, 2014.
You can call the Congressional switchboard at 877-210-5351 to be connected to your Representative’s office or you can click here for a contact list with the names of housing staffer’s and their phone numbers for each of New Jersey’s congressional offices.
After calling, please email the National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC) to let them know which office you called and how the call went.
As background, prior to the passage of the PTFA in May 2009, tenants living in a property in foreclosure were often required to move with as little as a few days’ notice. These renters often had no idea that their landlord had fallen behind on mortgage payments and renters usually had continued to pay their rent even as their landlord had failed to pay the mortgage.
The enactment of the PTFA was a major step forward in achieving housing stability for enters after a foreclosure, as the law ensures that most tenants can stay in their homes for the remainder of their leases or for at least 90 days post-foreclosure.
On April 25, 2012, Huffington Post blogger, Christine Schanes, very effectively makes the case for “thinking globally, acting locally” around ending homelessness. She writes that we “have the power and ability to solve other complex global issues, including homelessness.”
Schanes offers the National Alliance to End Homelessness’ (The Alliance) two annual conferences as excellent examples of thinking more globally around truly ending a problem plaguing our society that can feel overwhelming. For example, at its February 2012 National Conference on Ending Family and Youth Homelessness, The Alliance and its partners the following best practices:
She quotes The Alliance’s Steve Berg about why he sees these national events as so critical, “Helping end homelessness, he concludes, ‘is a movement and conferences are important to keep the movement going.”
At the same time, we must also continue to act locally and Scanes provides the now national Project Homelessness Connect model and San Diego Volunteer Lawyer Program as excellent examples of how this can be done. Project Homelessness Connect (PHC) originated in San Francisco and now is successfully implemented in cities across the country every year, including in almost all of the communities right here in New Jersey.
What more can we do in NJ to “think globally and act locally?” Can we send more of our advocates, service providers, and policy makers to The Alliance’s annual conferences? Can we build on the success of the PHC model and pilot the San Diego Volunteer Lawyer Program in a few of our local communities?
Click here to read the full Huffington Post article.
Bobbi Ibarra heads up Miami’s Coalition to End Homelessness and in her May 16, 2012 blog post on the Huffington Post, about city’s Faces of Homelessness Speakers Bureau, which is expanding to also share stories through their blog.
The Bureau was established primarily as a response to hate crimes against the homeless and includes profiles such as youth who are part of homeless families. Individuals and families featured get away from the stereotypical homeless profile of a single adult living on the street and often facing chronic homelessness.
Writes Ibarra:
In order for our readers to acquire a better understanding of an individual’s experience entering the realm of homelessness and the efforts they underwent to have that be one of their life’s journeys, we will be featuring their stories in future blogs,
Although, NJ has increasingly been effective in removing stereotypes, what can we do in NJ to share “the faces of homelessness?” Please let us know what you are doing so we can work together to remove stereotypes!
Click here to read the full article.
Click here to learn more about the Speaker’s Bureau.
The Family and Youth Services Bureau (FYSB) within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is soliciting grant applications for the Basic Center, Transitional Living, and Maternity Group Homes programs within the consolidated Runaway and Homeless Youth Act (RHYA) program.
Click here for more information about the Basic Center program.
Click here for the 2012 and 2013 funding announcements for the Transitional and Maternity Programs.
On Friday May 20, 2012, Poverty Research Institute (NJPRI) released the Poverty Benchmarks 2012. The report documented that almost one-quarter of the residents of NJ were living in poverty.
Legal Services of NJ established NJPRI in 1997. The Poverty Benchmarks is an ongoing data collection effort that aims to increase understanding of poverty in New Jersey as a foundation for more effective public response to the reality of poverty and its consequences.
With continued high unemployment – as of March 2012, the unemployed numbered 412,700 – the report anticipates that poverty is likely to grow this year.
Melville D. Miller Jr., president of Legal Services, summarized the impact by saying:
“The especially disturbing thing is now a couple of years after the great recession, poverty has increased. Our calculations suggest that this is really now at the highest level.”
Among the key facts were:
Click here to read the full report.
On May 16, 2012, the Press of Atlantic City continued to cover the bill recently introduced in the New Jersey State Assembly intended to end “Greyhound” or “Bus” Therapy. Assemblymen John Amodeo and Chris Brown (both R-Atlantic)’s proposed legislation “would require a minimum level of communication before a homeless person is relocated.” The hope is that this requirement would deter municipalities and service providers from sending homeless individuals across borders into Atlantic City.
The Press’ editorial follows up a May 8, 2012 article that covered the bill’s introduction and the story behind it. The Press’ editorial board writes:
The bill contributes to a discussion we need to have in New Jersey. It is simply wrong for other towns to think that homelessness is Atlantic City’s responsibility, just as it is wrong to treat homeless people as a problem to be exported - out of sight, out of mind - rather than as people who need help.
The piece supports inter-municipality and interagency cooperation and applauds Governor Christie’s recent creation of the State Interagency Council on Homelessness.
Click here to read the full editorial.
Click here to read Monarch’s previous post about the May 8 article.
On April 30, Washington Post columnist Petula Dvorak explores where young adults, between ages 18-21, facing today’s poor job market and housing crisis turn when they have not family support.
Quoting from her column:
“It’s the myth of 18,” said Daniel Brannen, executive director of Covenant House Washington, which focuses on housing and helping this group of young adults. “It’s been a myth in America for a long time that when you hit 18, you’re on your own, you’re an adult, you can make it.”
Sadly, many of these youth are not able to pursue their dreams of college and instead are lucky to settle for low wage paying jobs and end up living in shelters or “couch surfing” staying briefly with different friends and family. Often the support of a stable, older adult would make the difference but in absence of that, they need affordable housing and services.
Covenant House in Washington, D.C., will soon release a report focusing on this population which found that:
We must continue to push for funding for supportive housing targeted towards this population along with other policy solutions. It would be a great injustice to leave this segment of our young adult population behind and with no hope for the future.
Click here to read Dvorak’s column.
