SmartCitiesDive, Ysabelle Kempe, July 2, 2023

Dive Brief:

• Through a federal initiative announced Thursday, the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness and its 19 federal member agencies will accelerate local efforts to tackle unsheltered homelessness in six places: Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Seattle, the Phoenix metropolitan area and the state of California.
• The “ALL INside” initiative will work closely with these communities for up to two years, offering each the assistance of a dedicated federal official and teams to navigate federal funding streams, facilitate a peer learning network across the selected communities and identify opportunities for regulatory relief and flexibilities.
• As part of the initiative, which the announcement described as “first-of-its-kind,” a slew of federal agencies launched new efforts to address barriers for communities and people to access federal housing resources and support.

Dive Insight:

Unsheltered homelessness in the U.S. rose during the pandemic, the announcement says. For the first time, more people experiencing homelessness are living and sleeping in tents, transit stations and other unsheltered locations than in shelters or transitional housing. 

“Our nation’s homelessness challenge at its roots comes down to an inadequate supply of housing, but it also intersects with mental and behavioral health, substance use and so many other key issues,” U.S. Domestic Policy Council Director Susan Rice said at a Thursday press conference.

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