March 11, 2016
VA Promotes Vision for the Grant and Per Diem Program

In an open letter to GPD grantees, Department of Veterans Affairs Deputy Secretary Sloan Gibson encouraged program providers to take steps to further align housing interventions with Housing First approaches. The vision promoted through this letter will help ensure that housing resources are aligned with other programs and agencies and are best suited to ensuring that homelessness among Veterans is rare, brief, and non-recurring. 

Joe Savage, USICH regional coordinator, explores what this means for providers.
  
Federal Partners Announce States Selected for Medicaid-Housing Technical Assistance

Eight states will participate in intensive technical assistance to strengthen state-level collaboration between Medicaid and housing agencies. The efforts are aimed to bring supportive housing to scale by coordinating housing resources with Medicaid-covered services.

Policy Advisor Lindsay Knotts shares how these efforts will help states end chronic homelessness.

Promising Progress in Demonstration Project, Tailoring Services for High-Needs Families

Family of six. Over 300 families facing significant and complex challenges have been successfully housed in a five-site, three-year demonstration. Housing combined with supportive services are helping families stay together and reduce their involvement with child welfare. 

Deb De Santis, president and CEO of CSH, and USICH Policy Director Jasmine Hayes explain.

New Resource for Ending Veteran Homelessness

Page 1 of Questions document This new tool provides questions, based on the federal criteria and benchmarks, to help you assess whether your community has achieved the goal of ending Veteran homelessness.

Your community can use this resource to identify ways to strengthen your efforts or as you prepare to submit a request for federal confirmation that your community has achieved the goal.
Join HUD Discussion on Shaping Youth Demonstration Grants

Last year, the federal government released the   blueprint for a coordinated community response to preventing and ending youth homelessness . HUD's FY 2016 budget includes up to $33 million for a demonstration project that explores how best to implement that response.

As planning gets underway, join one of two calls to discuss your experience as part of your community's crisis response system, and how HUD could help strengthen your community's coordinated response.

Listening Session #1: March 17, 3:00 p.m., EST
Listening Session #2: March 24, 3:00 p.m. EST