Housing Law Commons^™

Homeless And Helpless: How The United States Has Failed Those With Severe And Persistent Mental Illness, Ashley Gorfido

Journal of Law and Health

The United States has failed its citizens who suffer from severe and persistent mental illness (SPMI). Homelessness is one of the most obvious manifestations of this failure. The combination of a lack of effective treatment, inadequate entitlement programs such as Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), and subpar housing options form systemic barriers that prevent people suffering from mental illness from being able to obtain adequate housing. Cultural beliefs within the United States regarding who is homeless and what homelessness means also play a significant role in the development of positively impactful social welfare programs.

Part II of this Note reviews …

Families Belong Together: The Path To Family Sanctity In Public Housing, Mckayla Stokes

Northwestern Journal of Law & Social Policy

In its 2015 landmark civil rights decision in Obergefell v. Hodges, the Supreme Court finally held that the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the United States Constitution guarantee same-sex couples’ marital equality. The Court’s unprecedented declaration that the right to marry is a fundamental right under the Due Process Clause strengthened married couples’ right to privacy because it subjects government actions infringing on marital unions to heightened scrutiny. The Supreme Court has the option to minimize the impact of Obergefell by interpreting the right to marriage very narrowly—as only encompassing the right to enter into a state-recognized union …

The Relationship Between Self-Determination And Client Outcomes Among The Homeless, Samuel M. Hanna

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This paper has attempted to determine if there is a significant relationship between self-determination and client outcomes among the homeless. The study has been based upon the conceptual framework set forth in Self-Determination Theory. The purpose of the study was to explore the relationship between self-determination and client outcomes among the homeless. Using a data collection instrument, based on empirically validated instrumentation, clients from several homeless service providers in the City of San Bernardino were assessed for the level of self-determination and autonomy support they experience within these agencies. Outcome measures included such things as whether the client was going …

Rapid Re-Housing Of Families Experiencing Homelessness In Massachusetts: Maintaining Housing Stability, Tim H. Davis, Terry S. Lane

Center for Social Policy Publications

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (“Recovery Act”) provided $1.5 billion for the Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing Program (HPRP), a temporary program that addressed both homelessness prevention and rapid re-housing of families already experiencing homelessness. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) allocated $44.5 million, including $26.1 million to individual Massachusetts communities and $18.4 million to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Of its funds, the state allocated $8.3 million for rapid re-housing of families who were living in shelters or motels.

This report explores the experiences of 486 of these families who received rapid re-housing assistance …

Massachusetts' System Redesign To End Homelessness: An Overview And Assessment, Donna H. Friedman, Ghazal Zulfiqar

Center for Social Policy Publications

The Clayton-Mathews and Wilson 2003 analysis of Massachusetts’ expenditures of state and federal dollars to address family homelessness documented a serious system misalignment of public resources: that is, 80% of state and federal resources were tied up in shelter provision, while only 20%, including rental assistance, were designated for homelessness prevention (Clayton-Matthews and Wilson, 2003). Their analysis demonstrated what many had long suspected: if homelessness is to be ended in Massachusetts, fundamental changes would be needed to shift the state system from shelter-oriented toward prevention-oriented. Both the Romney and the Patrick administrations have clearly prioritized this objective with broad-based support …

The First Two Years Of Housing First In Quincy, Massachusetts: "This Place Gives Me Peace, Happiness, And Hope", Tatjana Meschede

Center for Social Policy Publications

Housing First is a housing and support services program that attempts to move the most disabled homeless people directly to housing prior to treatment, using housing as the transforming element to support participation in treatment. This approach does not require sobriety or participation in long-term treatment programs unlike the traditional continuum of care approach. Promising results have been demonstrated in a number of projects using this model (Tsemberis & Eisenberg, 2000).

For the past ten years, Father Bill’s Place (FBP), a homeless shelter and housing program in Quincy, Massachusetts, has moved steadily towards providing permanent housing with supportive services, rather …

Preventing Homelessness And Promoting Housing Stability: A Comparative Analysis, Donna H. Friedman, Jennifer Raymond, Kimberly Puhala, Tatjana Meschede, Julia Tripp, Mandira Kala

Center for Social Policy Publications

This final evaluation report is the culmination of a three-year investment of time, energy and resources involving 28 Massachusetts nonprofit organizations: 7 foundations, led by the Boston Foundation, The Massachusetts Department of Housing and Community Development; and Homes for Families which joined with the Center for Social Policy team to conduct 10 focus groups involving 72 parents and individuals who shared their perspectives on homelessness prevention, with the guidance of a consumer advisory board involving six persons who have experienced homelessness. Collectively, we engaged in this evaluation effort because we believed that the outcomes of interventions, practice experience of service …

Housing Resources Leveraged By The Special Homeless Initiative Of The Massachusetts Department Of Mental Health, 1992–2006: Evaluation Of The Special Homeless Initiative, Massachusetts Department Of Mental Health, Tatjana Meschede, Helen Levine, Martha R. Burt

Center for Social Policy Publications

This and a companion report are the first products of an evaluation of the Special Homeless Initiative, a funding stream that began in 1992 and has grown to become an essential tool available to the Department of Mental Health for preventing and ending homelessness among vulnerable people with serious mental illness.

Moving Here Saved My Life: The Experience Of Formerly Chronically Homeless Women And Men In Quincy's Housing First Projects, Tatjana Meschede

Center for Social Policy Publications

For the past ten years, Father Bill’s Place (FBP) in Quincy, Massachusetts, has moved steadily towards providing permanent housing with supportive services rather than emergency shelter as a solution to ending homelessness. According to John Yazwinski, executive director of FBP, the vision for the future is to be able to independently house every homeless person entering FBP within a short period of time instead of “housing” people in the shelter for prolonged periods. As such, sheltering homeless people in mass emergency shelters should be a picture of the past.

Yazwinski’s Housing First Model builds upon an approach of housing “chronically” …

The Housing Crisis Enters The 1990s, Peter Dreier, Richard Appelbaum

New England Journal of Public Policy

Homelessness in the United States is a symptom of a much deeper economic and housing crisis — a widening gap between incomes and housing prices. With the end of the Cold War, the nation has the resources to solve these problems, but to do so it must mobilize the political will. This article examines the roots of crisis, the public policies and market forces that created it, and policy recommendations to solve the problem. Key to forging a solution is building the political coalition needed to create a broad public consensus.

Housing The Homeless Through Expanding Access To Existing Housing Subsidies, Barbara Sard

New England Journal of Public Policy

The premise of this article is that homelessness in America today is essentially a product of the lack of affordable housing for very low-income people. The article outlines this central income/housing gap analysis as the factual predicate of the goal to alleviate homelessness through securing subsidized housing resources for the homeless and imminently homeless. It explains why, based on the nature and number of annually available housing subsidies, expanding access to existing housing subsidies is a valuable, workable, short-term, at least partial solution to the immediate crisis of lack of affordable housing, albeit one which does not negate the acknowledged …

It's Hard Outside: Profiles Of Elderly Homelessness, Joseph Doolin

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article is a qualitative study of the lives of homeless elders in Boston. It examines the concerns uppermost in the minds of the homeless including the art of integrating their past lives into the values and milieu of their current homeless situation. Concern about the reinstitutionalization of the mentally ill in public shelters, domiciles once reserved for the older alcoholic, the pressures and stress of shelter life, victimization, the shrinking supply of SRO units, and the role of alcohol are also examined. Considered in detail are various coping strategies and supports utilized by older adults in their survival roofless. …