December 19, 2019

On Monday, the US Supreme Court refused to hear a case from Boise, Idaho, that challenged a ruling by a federal appeals court that if no other shelter is available, people experiencing homelessness have a constitutional right to sleep on sidewalks or in public parks. Instead of criminalizing homelessness, some advocates, such as Rev. Andy Bales, CEO of the Union Rescue Mission, say that policymakers should focus on “immediate 24/7/365 shelters with comprehensive services and case management.”

Stonewall House, which opened its doors on Tuesday, is the first-ever LGBT-friendly senior affordable housing development in New York City. In New York, there are more than 100,000 LGBT elders, many of whom face significant housing difficulties including affordability and discrimination. “It’s important we build more [housing] and provide the training and support in a mainstream senior housing context so all housing is welcoming of LGBTQ people,” said Michael Adams, CEO of SAGE. “We see our elders as heroes and want them to be treated as such when living in their own homes,” Adams said.

A coalition of affordable housing advocates is working to make Charlotte the first city in North Carolina to pass protections for tenants who pay rent with federal and local housing vouchers or other forms of subsidized income. Fifteen states and nearly 100 cities and counties have source of income antidiscrimination laws. “With the housing affordability crisis and the difficulty that families have breaking into the housing market, many cities are considering this a crucial protection,” said Philip Tegeler, executive director of the Poverty and Race Research Action Council.

Impact Justice, an Oakland criminal justice reform organization, launched the Homecoming Project to connect homeowners with available rooms to people coming out of prison. Impact Justice acts as a matchmaker between hosts and tenants, pays for the first six months of rent, and provides support services to both host homeowners and newly released tenants. The program’s coordinator, Terah Lawyer, says it’s important that formerly incarcerated people live somewhere where they have connections to a positive community. “The way [the system] is currently designed, [formerly incarcerated people] are still ostracized from society, and they are having to fight to get back in,” said Lawyer.

In northwest Michigan’s rural counties, housing is scarce. The thriving tourism industry and ownership of seasonally used cottages have been a further strain on the housing shortage, and vacationers take up a lot of housing needed by seasonal and service-industry workers. County leaders are working toward long-term structural housing change, but to address the immediate need for housing, many moderate-income residents in seasonal and service industries are moving to motel rooms, campsites, and shelters. At one of the larger homeless shelters in the region, Safe Harbor in Traverse City, about 40 percent of occupants have full-time jobs.