What if the displacement solution is not more shelters, but less evacuated?
In Santa Clara Province, a new model with the support of technology and strategy that calmly depends on how society deals with housing security. Its method is simple: caught families before they fall.
By working directly with the owners, the boycott program provides short -term cash assistance to tenants facing evacuation. The approach proves more effective-cost-effective-than many traditional programs.
Why did we write this
With the spread of the housing crisis, the province of Santa Clara is a pioneer in a special model. It keeps families in their homes instead of waiting for them to be homeless to help.
In San Jose, the average rental of two bedrooms has ended $ 3,300 a month A higher increase in the national average of $ 1883. For low -income families working here, the error margin is shaving. Housing instability can start with a lost salary company or an unexpected bill.
Linda Ngwin knows how quickly collapse.
San Jose Mom runs her work that provides emergency mental health services from home. When the mold injury led to a serious health diagnosis in the past winter, it was forced to close. She and her 14 -year -old son spent nights in their car to escape from the poisonous air inside their home.
Even after finding a safer house near her son’s school, Mrs. Najouen struggled to keep up with the rent. “It is ridiculous. I was making six numbers and I still consider low entry,” she recalls.
Then the District Distinction Prevention System (HPS) enters. Within a few days, the program covered its deposit and rent the first month. The help came in time.
“All it takes is one disaster – whether mold is at home or your car collapses,” says Ms. Ngwin, who wipes tears. “There must be more resources for people like me who work.”
Data supports them. The income loss is a major cause of homelessness in California, according to 2023 state levels From the Benioff Housing and Housing initiative at the University of California. Many homeless population said that modest support – less than $ 300 a month – could have kept them in their homes.
Santa Clara province takes this logic seriously. KJ Kaminski, Acting Director of the Housing Office in the province, believes that prevention is one of the most effective tools to treat homelessness in its root.
“The more people who can remain from homelessness, the better,” says Ms. Kaminski. “Not only is our system and cost of our society, but also for those individuals and families who do not have to try the shock and challenges that come with not overcoming it.”
Since the launch of the program as a pilot in 2017, Mrs. Kaminski has seen that she helps thousands of families to fall into homelessness every year. “This may be a short -term intervention, but it has a long -term effect,” she added.
In 2023, Wilson Shihan Laboratory for Economic Opportunities at the University of Notre Dame I released a study On HPS. It was found that the program prevented displacement instead of just delaying it. The study says that families receiving assistance were 81 % less vulnerable to displacement within six months, and the less likely 73 % within 12 months.
“This type of temporary intervention allows people to show their elasticity, return to stability, and allow them to be independent,” says David Phillips, professor of economics research at Notre Dame, who participated in composing the study.
Private capital, the public good
HPS started as a public and private partnership in 2017 by the destination: Home, a non -profit organization that ends the displacement in Silicon Valley.
“At that time in 2017, for everyone who helped us out of the streets, it became three homeless,” says Jennifer Loew, CEO of Destination: Home: “We did not have a defense line to prevent families from falling homeless.”
In 2018, the Tech Titans Cisco and Apple contributed $ 50 million to strengthen the housing and innovation box supporting non -profit organizations to expand housing at reasonable prices and strengthen HPS.
According to the destination: The home, by providing flexible and short support in the short term without strict hats, more than 18,400 families-more than 33,000 people-have been stabilized since 2017. More than 90 % remained in their homes two years later.
Last year, Santa Clara province took over HPS. Mrs. Kaminski says they have learned that it is “an effective model. It is logical to merge [it] In the broader boycott system. “
Despite her wealth, Santa Clara is a boycott that includes the largest number of unwanted population in the Gulf region with its largest city, San Jose, its arrangement Seventh In the nation for homelessness. Contrary to common belief, most of its unique populations are not new. About 85 % of the people surveyed during 2023 points on time I mentioned that they were a resident of the province when they became homeless. And 54 % lived there for 10 years or more.
While displacement prevention programs are present in cities like Chicago and Sayattle, the Santa Clara Province model promotes its use of private funds and flexibility in providing emergency relief designed to meet the needs of each family. On average, families receive more than $ 7,000 and usually need help for three to six months.
“One of the lessons in Santa Clara is that private investment can stimulate innovation and public investment can ensure sustainability,” says Jeff Olivet, the chief adviser at Harvard Second Chan Public Health on Health and Displacement.
“Unless we can prevent displacement before starting it, we will never replace homelessness in general,” says Mr. Olivet, former CEO of the Council of the Council between the US agencies for displacement during the era of President Joe Biden. Mr. Olivet is the top supportive advisers: home efforts and search for chances of repetition in other societies throughout the country.
It warns that societies need to invest in prevention strategies, expand housing supplies and improve the ability to withstand costs. “But it cannot be either or thinking-it should be a final thinking,” he added.
Melanie Steston Freeman/Staff
In the event of an emergency
For Binda Flores, it took only three weeks so that her family was in danger. She, her husband and two daughters live in one bedroom apartment in a complex in Sanifel. She supports her husband’s income from the function of the family, while raising her daughters, who are between the ages of 14 and 6.
In 2021, her husband was transferred to the hospital for two weeks from a back injury. The family faced a hospital bill worth $ 2,500. He also accused $ 1850 for renting that month because he could not work.
“Unless we have to rent, we did not have the bill,” says Ms. Flores, in Spanish, via a picnic table near her apartment. “He gave us a feeling of unable to do anything. It was not because we did not want to pay the rent.”
The property owner published a notification of evacuation on their door, and contacted the HPS family. Within a few days, the case manager arrived at the owner to stop the evacuation process.
The program covered the family rent for six months and provided a $ 1,000 salary towards the medical bill. Two months later, Mrs. Flores’s husband recovered completely and the family started calculating savings. The family still lives in the same apartment.
HPS works through a network of about 20 non -profit service providers, and they work together to connect families to emergency rent, cases management, legal assistance and other cash support.
When one of the residents apply for help, their information is entered in a central database accessed by all partner agencies. The goal of this is to ensure the “lack of wrong door” approach, regardless of where a person is looking for, can quickly be directed to the services they need.
Applicants should be residing in the province, qualify for low -income people, face evacuation within 14 days, and be at risk of displacement.
“We only have thousands of families who are one salary away from homelessness,” says Ms. Kaminski. “One of the medical incidents that may affect their financial resources, loss of job, or family separation.”
Mrs. Ngwin Sandra Monoz met when she arrived to help in February. Mrs. Monoz has worked as a case manager at LifeMoves, a temporary supportive housing program, over the past twenty years.
“Every aspect of my work is to prevent homelessness,” says Ms. Monoz. She says her customers usually need help only once. “Every day I came to work, I am proud of my work.”
Mrs. Ngwin says she is grateful to Mrs. Monoz and the organization not only helping to help rent, but to restore her confidence in society’s programs.
“I was carrying this burden myself,” says Ms. Ngwin. “When I called Sandra, I cried with tears of joy. Joy and relief. I am still here because of her.”
The reports of this story were supported by Verina Martinez in Sanifel, California.
